


Without Crowns, Without Borders

by StainedGlassSpecs



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Developing Relationships, F/F, F/M, Found Family, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Multi, Other poly relationships but I haven't configured them yet, Post-Descendants 2, Pre-Poly, Some Swearing, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2020-02-07 11:32:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 56,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18619780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StainedGlassSpecs/pseuds/StainedGlassSpecs
Summary: Ben is committed to making changes for the Isle. Uma just wants to protect the scraps she's got. They form an uneasy alliance to keep the children of the Isle safe, but between Auradon politics and new threats rising on the Isle, this is easier said than done.Also featuring: Ben and Evie the Political Dream Team, Harry Hating Everything, Mal Hating Everything (but coming around eventually), Ben doesn't understand Isle relationships (but kinda wants to), kids in positions of authority forced to act like adults, and is someone missing a purple lizard?





	1. Political Negotiations

**Author's Note:**

> Whoo boy. I wasn't going to post this until it was close to being completed, because I don't need another WIP on my hands. But I'm 20,000 words in and need feedback on where to take it, so here we go again.
> 
> Couple things to consider:  
> \- I haven't read the books or any other supplementary material, so this fic will be purely based on the movies, and whatever else I use to fill in the gaps. Some familiar names might pop up, but I'm I guess you could consider it an AU in that sense? Honestly everything about this universe confuses me, so I dunno.  
> \- Although the characters are teenagers and the target demographic is, I guess, kids to early teens, there are some very mature themes. Nothing is going to be graphic or necessarily happen 'on screen', but please heed all the tags. And let me know if you think they ever need updating.

Even at the best of times, Auradon State Representative Council meetings were the worst.

Ben hadn’t always felt that way. Back when he was first preparing to be king, two years earlier than planned because of public demand, he had been glad to have people older, wiser and smarter than him to help him make decisions. But then his proclamation happened, and there had been such an uproar from the Council that he’s almost been forced to rescind his order. Thankfully, his father had backed him up at the last minute (citing that it may be a mistake, but it was _Ben_ ’s mistake and he’d never learn if he wasn’t allowed to make it, and also Belle would make him sleep downstairs for a week if he disappointed their son).

Since then, any matter that he tried to present to them was met with scepticism and wariness. Especially matters relating to the Isle of the Lost. Now, it wasn’t like their worries weren’t valid. Ben could see that. It was just that they were all still stuck in a time when villains reigned supreme and drastic measures were the only way to guarantee their people’s safety. That made them scared, stubborn and utterly resistant to new ideas. They argued with every point he made, trying to shoot him down with angry questions, shaking heads and condescending looks. Ben persisted. He weathered it all with a teeth-clenched smile and patient answers, persisting with them until finally getting what he wanted. So far, he’d managed to approve extra food shipments to the Isle (real food, too, not just waste and leftovers), and relocated Dizzy Tremaine, but anything more than that was proving to be much harder.

Ben was used to this. Evie was not. When she was appointed as his royal councillor and the first ever Isle Representative, Ben had been worried about bringing her to the Council meetings, because he knew how brutal it would be for her.

Evie only laughed when he’d warned her about it, barely looking up from her sewing machine as she designed herself a new outfit for the Council. “Oh, Ben,” she said. “Trust me, I can handle a little bad press.”

He sighed and put his hands in his pockets, trying to find the words to explain how demoralising it could be. “I know, and I don’t think anyone could do this job as well as you. But it’s not like at school. These people aren’t just bullies, they genuinely believe they’re doing the right thing, and they won’t pull any punches.”

“I can take a few punches,” she said breezily, but firmly. Ben got the message. Evie was a lot tougher than she looked – being on the Isle with her had demonstrated that quite clearly – and this was her decision to make. “Besides, I’m gonna put some little shoulder pads in this. Nothing crazy, but enough to give it that extra edge. No one messes with shoulder pads.”

So she attended the Council, and managed to present her proposal with a confident smile, despite the Council’s angry mutterings. Only once did she glance at him uncertainly. He squeezed her hand briefly, smiling to let her know she was doing great. Then he stood by her to help field the interrogation.

“King Benjamin,” the Queen Mother Leah, Audrey’s grandmother, spoke up. “And … Miss Evie. We are concerned that your proposal does not fully consider the risks inherent in bringing more villainous children to Auradon.”

Evie bristled at the ‘villainous children’ remark, but Ben bent forward to answer. “Thank you for presenting your concerns, Queen Leah. Would you be so kind as to elaborate on what risks you refer to?”

“They’ll bring down the barrier! Just like the other two!” one of the Atlantican representatives said, causing a murmur of agreement to echo around the room.

“As I recall,” Ben said. “The barrier was only broken once, and then repaired due to the heroic efforts of Mal, daughter of Maleficent. However, we acknowledge this concern, and extra security measures will be put in place to assure this does not happen.”

“This list you speak of,” Doc the dwarf said. “What criteria are you placing on the children you wish to bring here?”

Ben nodded at Evie to answer. She took a deep breath. “Well, I’ve decided to start with the children who I know would agree to come, and who would therefore make a real effort to adjust. They are leaders within their community. They would also help to role-model and mentor any future students who might find it harder.”

“King Ben,” the merman spoke again, interrupting Evie. “Do you trust the word of the Evil Queen’s daughter?”

Ben swallowed down his anger. “Yes, I do.”

“And can we trust your word?” Queen Leah said.

There was an awkward pause as everyone considered the pointed comment. King Adam frowned, unhappy with the implied accusation against his son. “I beg your pardon?” Ben said mildly.

She pursed her lips. “I mean no offence, Benjamin, but you are rather … close to the villain children already living here. Furthermore, you’ve been placed under, not one, but two love spells by them. You must forgive us for wondering if your judgement in this area is impaired.”

Ben smiled tightly. “I see your point. Of course, I would be the first to admit that I’ve put myself in a position of risk many times to pursue a goal, perhaps without much foresight. I’m still learning, as you all know. As for those who cast the spell, I’m not making excuses, but it is clear to me that the spells were cast because of a lack of other options available to them. As you can imagine, growing up on an island prison does not give kids many resources for survival. Being at Auradon will give them the opportunity to be safe and happy without needing to resort to such tactics.”

Queen Leah shook her head. “Your naivete is charming, Benjamin, but naïve all the same. I am not convinced.”

A few others mumbled their agreement. Ben could sense that he was losing the room. Evie then stepped forward to speak once again. “I think what _King_ Benjamin is trying to say,” she said pointedly, glancing at the queen mother. “Is that he can be far too trusting. I know I thought as much when I first met him, even though it was just adorable.” She ruffled his hair, causing a few people to chuckle. “But it was exactly his kind spirit that helped us to believe that we could be safe and free here. He inspired us to make better choices, and I just know that, given the chance, others would feel the same way. You see, none of us are born evil, any more than you. All we need is a chance, and for people like Ben to believe in us.”

She and Ben exchanged a smile. Part of her speech was for the benefit of the room, but he knew that the sentiment was genuine.

“I agree with Miss Evie,” Doc said, a sentiment that was echoed by his fellow dwarves. “Everyone deserves a chance to be cared for, regardless of where they’ve come from. We once took in a young girl whose family mistreated her. She turned out perfectly well, and in fact, supports the motion for more children to come to Auradon.”

“Here, here,” the wizard Merlin said.

“I agree.”

“As do we.”

As the endorsements rang across the room, King Beast stood up. “Then it’s decided,” he said. “We will re-establish King Ben’s proclamation to bring four new children from the Isle of the Lost to Auradon. A recurring timeframe will be established in consultation with Fairy Godmother, who will oversee their transition into Auradon Preparatory School.”

“Actually!” Evie burst out, grinning so hard that her face nearly split in half. “We want to bring more than four at a time! Ben and I both think that eight would be the best number to start with!”

The room went silent for a moment. Then the uproar started.

_

When the Council finally stopped to take a break, Ben’s head was pounding. Evie didn’t move for a minute, looking both angry and distraught. Gently, he touched her elbow and escorted her out the side door.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered to him as they walked. “I didn’t know that would happen.”

“It’s not your fault. I should have said that we can only scrape one matter through at a time, or else the Council spontaneously combusts.”

“It’s just so stupid! The longer we leave it, the less we’ll be able to help them!”

“I know. Don’t worry, okay? We’ll make it happen.” Ben tried to smile reassuringly at her, despite feeling exhausted.

When they got out into the hallway, Mal was leaning against the wall, Jay was pacing back and forth, and Carlos was sitting on the floor, typing away on his laptop. They all glanced up hopefully as Evie and Ben came to meet them. “How’d it go?” Carlos asked.

Evie’s face crumpled and she flopped down into the seat beside him. He stood up to give her a hug, looking bewildered.

“That bad, huh?” Jay said.

“Shocker,” Mal muttered.

Ben scrubbed a hand over his face. At the other end of the hall, he saw Audrey meet her grandmother. The two of them gave him and his friends a distrustful look. He purposefully turned his back on them to address his friends. “It’s not _that_ bad. We’re on track, it’s just … slow.”

Mal looked like she was swallowing down a sharp retort. She had her reservations about Evie’s plan, believing that most of the kids on the Isle just wouldn’t adjust to Auradon, and that the pressure would lead to catastrophe. Thankfully, she chose not to reiterate her opinion right at this moment. Instead, she took his hand and said, “You wanna get out of here? There’s a coffee place just downstairs.”

He smiled gratefully. “Sounds great.”

With the assistance of caffeine, lots of sugar, and Carlos’ laptop, the five of them managed to hash out a plan for the rest of the debate and Evie recovered her confidence. By the time the Council went back into session, they were able to argue their point with renewed vigour, and even swayed a few others to their side. They managed to compromise; six new students would be transferred every four months. This, Fairy Godmother argued, would give them the bare minimum of time to adjust, and for the school to adjust to them.

“Hold on one moment,” the Romani representative Esmeralda said before they were finished. She’d been quiet for the majority of the meeting, but when she spoke, everyone listened. “From what you’ve said of this place, the children left waiting will continue to be exposed to all kinds of neglect and danger; even from their own families. I believe you said that the Isle doesn’t even have a _doctor_.” Here she glared up at King Adam briefly. “How can we justify leaving them in this situation?”

Her words sent a wave of uncomfortable fidgeting throughout the room. Adam cleared his throat before answering. “We did try to appoint doctors, over the years,” he said. “The position became untenable due to safety concerns.”

“Such as?” Esmeralda demanded.

“Kidnappings, mostly,” Evie said, answering rather reluctantly. “People wanting to keep the medical help for themselves. Or try to ransom them for freedom. But also a few attacks just because it’s considered weak, on the Isle, to ask for help.”

“That’s right,” Adam said. “So getting people to work there became impossible.”

Esmeralda frowned. “My point stands. How do we leave kids in a situation like that, knowing how bad it is?”

“I suppose,” Ben said, smoothly interjecting. “It would be a matter of finding people willing to work on the Isle, and being able to put the right protections in place. I can oversee this personally. I don’t believe anyone here would have a problem with that?”

No one raised any objections. In general, the people of Auradon preferred not to think about what went on beyond the barrier, or the people who went there. It was only the idea of villains coming _here_ that raised alarm bells. Ben nearly cracked a molar with how hard his teeth clenched at the sheer apathy of many Council members. Still, it was a small victory, and he’d take it.

“They do have a point, you know,” Evie said, later in her dorm room while Ben sprawled over Mal’s bed. “No one will want to work there. And even if we did, there’s no way we can guarantee their protection. The place is just too chaotic.”

Ben had been thinking about this for a while, ever since a girl with long, sea-green braids had tied him to her mast and forced him to re-evaluate his whole life. He swung his legs over the bed and gave them all a serious look. “Actually,” he said. “I do have one idea. But you’re not going to like it.”

Carlos and Jay looked intrigued, Evie looked hopeful, and Mal narrowed her eyes at him suspiciously. Oh yeah. She _really_ wasn’t going to like this.

_

Uma had barely finished her late shift at the chip shop when the trouble started. Some guy was thrown bodily through the swinging doors, crashing into one of the tables with a yell of pain. He was quickly followed by Harry storming into the shop, a wild look in his eyes. The last few customers scattered and ran out the door, while her crew jumped to their feet, ready to intervene. It wasn’t needed, though. Before the guy had a chance to react, Harry had one knee pressed on his stomach and his hook pointed at his eye, the tip of it already bloody from the shallow slash wound across the guy’s chest.

Harry spared her a grin. “Evening.”

“Harry,” Uma scolded, ripping her apron off. “What have I told you about getting blood on the tables?”

“A thousand apologies,” he replied, lifting the man up by the shirt and pushing him into the wall instead.

“Better. Now, what the hell?”

“Well you see, I caught this poor fellow mistakenly carving _his_ symbol onto one of _our_ buildings, and thought I’d take the opportunity to educate him.”

“Is that so?” Uma planted her hands on her hips and sauntered forward, sizing up the man. He was barely older than them, dressed in scraps of black leather with his hair done up in a topknot. His eyes darted from Harry, to her, to the crew members lurking behind her, and she could almost see the cogs of his brain turning as he tried to calculate the best odds of escape. Sadly for him, they were low. She tilted her head at him, catching his eye once again. “I’d say welcome to my turf, but you’ve already made yourself at home. So the question is, are you really that bold, or just very stupid?”

Incredibly, the man smiled. It was a nasty, mocking look, and Uma was no stranger to those, but for some reason it stung a little deeper than she was used to. Perhaps because someone with a hook at his throat in a den full of enemies shouldn’t have any reason to look so smug. “Your turf, little girl? Not for long.”

“What makes you say that?” She kept her tone lightly interested, despite her blood boiling.

“Everyone saw what happened across the barrier. Everyone knows you failed. If it weren’t for your rabid dog here,” he glanced at Harry. “You wouldn’t have a scrap of respect left.”

Harry pressed his hook to the man’s neck, drawing another speck of blood, trembling from the urge to finish him off. “I’ll show you _rabid,_ ” he snarled. Behind him, Gil and a few of the others stepped forward, drawing their own weapons. Their murderous faces warmed her heart a little.

“Harry,” Uma said. “Enough.”

Her first mate shot her a wild look. “Uma, you need to let me hook him,” he said beseechingly, and it was easy to blame his bloodlust, but there was a double-meaning to his words. If they let the miscreant go, it would only make her look weaker. No, she needed to set an example here. But it would have to be the right one.

“Let him go,” she said calmly, staring him down until he finally shoved the man back with a growl. Uma waited until he’d stepped back before taking his pace, front and centre before their captive. She smiled, and despite the man’s brave words, this seemed to unsettle him slightly. “What’s your name, Angelfish?” she asked.

He looked insulted. “You don’t know?”

She shrugged. He did look familiar – it was a small island. But in this place, you were either infamous or negligible. There was no in-between. Exactly which category you fell in depended on your parent’s name, or the reputation you managed to carve for yourself. Uma had both. “Can’t say I do.”

He drew himself up. “I am Li Fang. My father was Li Wei, also known as Bleda, of the great Hun army.”

Uma’s eyebrows went up. “Oh, one of Shan Yu’s gang. Haven’t seen them around in a while. What, you guys finally decide to crawl out from underground?”

Fang glared at her. “We are the future of the Isle.”

“Uh-huh, sure.” Uma did some fast thinking. Shan Yu’s crew were small and kept mostly to themselves, but they could be dangerous. If they were crawling out of the woodwork, then she ought to nip this in the bud. Smiling again, she spread her arms. “Well, you’re welcome to our humble little abode, of course. If you can take it.”

She snapped her fingers. Two of her crew mates on either side each tossed her a sword, and she caught both in her hands, twirling them for good measure. The thing about being a cecealian sea witch was that you had to keep track of a lot of limbs. Even though she’d never transformed once in her life before leaving the barrier, her brain was still wired the same. As a human, she was basically ambidextrous. Her skills with a sword were pretty legendary across the Isle. Noting Fang’s sudden wariness, she grinned and handed him one of the swords.

“Uh … I’m more of a long-range fighter,” he said.

“Not a lot of range in here,” she noted. “Close combat or nothing, I’m afraid.”

Swallowing heavily, Fang took the sword. She’d give him props for that, if nothing else. Her crew broke out into cheers, stepping back in a loose circle to give them space. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Harry’s bright, eager grin. About the only think he liked more than hurting people with pointy things was watching _her_ hurt people with pointy things.

Uma gave Fang a second to adjust to the weapon, before darting in to attack. He managed to parry the blow, his body leaning backwards in a way that would be easy to knock him off balance. But Uma didn’t want to end it too quickly. He needed to get the full picture, and besides, she’d been spoiling for a good fight ever since Cotillion. Fang steadied himself and swung the blade at her. She dodged easily and used his own momentum to kick him into a nearby table.

Her crew laughed and cheered. Fang growled and lunged for her again, his sword clashing loudly with hers as they met under the dim lights of the shop. The fight continued, gaining in speed and fluidity. Fang wasn’t accustomed to the weapon, but he was adaptive and very quick. Still, Uma could see the sweat bead on his forehead and upper lip, desperation creeping into his eyes while she only grew stronger. Adrenaline coursed through her veins. Maybe she felt powerless sometimes, but tonight, in this moment, she felt invincible.

Her sword nicked him in the shoulder and he stumbled back with a cry. Uma advanced, her teeth bared like a shark. The guys continued to whoop and holler, eager for a bloody finish.

“You see,” she said to Fang. “My crew respect me despite what happened across the barrier. They’re loyal because they know I mean business. But they _also_ know I’ll fight for them, not just myself.” She tilted her head and pouted mockingly. “If only your crew were here for you right now.”

“ _HEY!”_ her mother’s voice suddenly boomed from the kitchen. The whole restaurant vibrated as her thick, fat tentacles slapped across the floor. Uma and Fang both stumbled away from each other, turning towards the sound. Fang’s face went white with fear, whereas Uma just sighed in exasperation. “Enough! Shut up and take this nonsense _OUT OF MY SHOP!”_

 “Mom!” Uma rolled her eyes and flicked a few drops of blood off the end of her sword. “We were just finishing!”

“Finish it now!” Ursula said. Thankfully, she didn’t follow it up with her usual _‘Or I’ll turn you into fishbait!_ ’ It would have undermined whatever scraps of fear and respect Uma had managed to gain in the last few minutes.

Fang didn’t need any further encouragement. He threw the swords down and ran out of the shop, clutching his wounded shoulder tightly. Uma sighed and lowered her own sword.

“Sorry guys, show’s over,” she said. Her crew looked disappointed, but they gathered around and congratulated her, chanting her name as she wiped her sword down with an old rag. Another bellow from Ursula had them all dispersing, until only Harry and Gil were left.

“Y’should have let me hook him,” her first mate grumbled.

“And what? We go to war with the Huns?” She scoffed, shaking her head. “Better to send him back with his tail between his legs, Harry.”

“They’re not the only ones who want a piece of our pie,” he pointed out, following her around the shop as she cleared away the tables. Gil helpfully started picking up after her, too. “Just last week, I caught the Baduns hanging around by the docks!”

“Cruella’s idiots?” Uma said, laughing. “They were probably just looking for rodents to torture.”

“That’s not the point!” He stood in front of her, forcing her to stop and give him a hard look. “It’s disrespectful. People need to be taught a _lesson_.”

“I agree. But we do it _my way_. Remember?”

He nodded, taking a step back. “Aye, I remember.”

“Did I not prove my point well enough?”

“You kicked his _ass!_ ” Gil said excitedly.

“Yeah, I did. I’ll do it again, hell, I’ll do it a hundred times. No one’s taking our territory.” She ran a hand through Harry’s hair. He made a noise and leaned into the touch. “Okay?”

“Aye.” He grinned at her. “I do love it when you get violent.”

She chucked him under the chin. “You guys get on back to the ship. I’ll finish up and meet you back there.”

His brow furrowed. “Are you sure …”

“Yes,” she said firmly, her tone brooking no arguments.

Harry bowed, low and dramatic. “As you wish, my Queen.”

Uma laughed and shoved him lightly. “Get out of here.”

He sauntered out the door, jerking his head for Gil to follow. Gaston’s son hurriedly placed a pile of crockery on top of her table before heading out. However, he paused before leaving. “I just wanted to say,” he said to Uma. “We don’t care that your plan with the King didn’t work. We were just happy that you tried.”

Uma couldn’t help the wave of bitterness that rose within her throat. She’d tried to suppress it for weeks, but it was always there, waiting to choke her. “Even though I ran away?” she said.

Gil shrugged. “If you kept fighting, Mal would have burned you to a crisp. We’d rather have you here and alive than dead at the bottom of the ocean. I mean, _I’d_ rather that.”

Uma turned away to hide her smile. “I appreciate that, Gil.”

After he left, she finished clearing things away and sat down heavily on one of the benches. Her fingers found the shell around her throat, and she fiddled with it contemplatively. There were so many regrets she had about that whole business with the King. Ben. She wasn’t proud of the love spell (it was too much like Mal for her tastes) but she’d not regretted it. She would have done whatever it took. Break the barrier. Free her crew. Get revenge. That was all she’d cared about.

Now, Uma wondered if she should have just focused on the first two goals. Revenge was sweet, but impractical. Maybe if she’d taken the King’s offer, or at least _pretended_ to for a while, things would have been different. She and her crew might have been free. She wouldn’t be stuck back here, working thankless hours in her mom’s chip shop, trying to claw back her shreds of respect.

If only, if only. Uma had no time for if-only’s. She had a crew to protect, and a territory to defend. If that was all she ever got in life, it was more than most people on this Isle.

A shadow darkened the doorway of her mom’s shop. Uma jumped to her feet, wondering if the Hun gangbanger had come back, maybe with a few buddies. With no crew and an indifferent mother, Uma knew she was in a worse position. But she’d still fight, and probably (like, 70% chance) win.

The last thing she expected was for a man in Auradon colours step through the door, flanked by three others all dressed the same.

“Uma, daughter of Ursula the sea witch?” the one in front asked. In the back room, she heard her mother hiss.

“Yeah?” she demanded, her heart pounding. Maybe they were here to arrest her, for what she did at Cotillion. Uma tried to tell herself that it was no different, she’d still fight. But it her heart, she knew that would be useless. She wished Harry and Gil were still here. “What do you want?”

To her surprise, the guard pulled out something that looked, bizarrely, like a hand mirror. “King Ben wishes to speak to you.”


	2. The Mirror

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for all your feedback, guys! This chapter is much smaller than the last, but at least the Huma is Strong with this One.

Uma was curious enough to hear what the king had to say, but not stupid enough to do it within her mother’s earshot. Ursula generally kept out of Isle politics, but she'd cause trouble if she thought Uma deserved it. Instead, Uma led the guards to a small, abandoned shop close to the docks. People stared as they passed, but this was Uma’s prime territory, and one glare from her was enough to make them look away.

Almost all of them, anyway. As soon as Harry caught sight of her from the ship, flanked by Auradon guards, he stalked over with his hook and swords bared. Half her crew wasn’t far behind him, all of them prepared to fight, but with uncertainty and fear on their faces. Everyone knew that you didn’t attack the guards. Harry, of course, didn’t seem to care about that little rule as he approached, snarling and growling. “Let her go, you yellow-brained, baw-faced lubbers!”

“Harry!” Uma held her hand up, stopping him in his tracks. She was amused to see a few of the guards lean back, alarmed by either his viciousness or odd choice of insults. Making eye contact with him and Gil, she jerked her head towards the old building and entered it, trusting the two of them to follow her inside.

“What is this?” Harry hissed, glaring at the guards as they filed in.

“We’re about to have an audience with the king,” she said, causing him to shoot her a wide-eyed look. “I need you to let _me_ do the talking, alright?”

He raised his eyebrows. “By all means.”

Gil glanced around, confused. “The king? Where is he?”

Looking slightly exasperated, one of the guards held up the mirror, which he’d explained was actually an electronic tablet. Uma had demanded why it looked like that and he’d just shrugged, as if the king’s weird, over-the top aesthetic was a mystery even to him. Right now, he switched it on. It took a moment to buffer due to the Island’s bad signal, but eventually a picture came into focus. King Ben was sitting at a desk, his hands folded over the top of it.

“Oh good, it’s working,” he said, eyes lighting up as Uma and her crew appeared before him. Then he cleared his throat. “Hello.”

Uma raised an eyebrow. “Hey,” she deadpanned.

“How have you been?” he asked, as if they were old friends catching up.

She scoffed. “What do you want?”

“Well, I wanted to talk to you about a proposal.”

“You wanna marry me after all? And you couldn’t do it in person?” she and Harry shared a dark grin. “It’s almost as if you’re afraid of me or something.”

Ben smiled and shrugged. He was dressed in a tailored navy suit, a far cry from the dumbass leather Evie had obviously tried to hide him in when he was last on the Isle, but he still didn’t look like a king. Despite herself, it was easy for Uma to think of him as Ben, a dork with no self-preservation instincts, rather than King Benjamin. “Not a marriage proposal, sorry. And I would have come, actually, but certain individuals threatened to tie me to my own throne if I so much as tried.”

“That would be Mal and her scrappy little gang, I assume? Honestly, I’m surprised. I wouldn’t have thought a king would let other people make decisions for him.”

“I value the opinion of those closest to me,” he said diplomatically. “Even when I don’t entirely agree with them. Besides, you did put me under a love spell last time, and I’d prefer us to have a clear discussion about this. No tricks, no magic. Is that alright with you?”

Uma shrugged. “I don’t really have a choice, do I?”

“You made the choice to listen,” he told her. “Thank you for that.”

“I didn’t do it for you,” she snapped, and immediately regretted it. “ _I didn’t do it for you!”_ She’d screamed at her mother when she was mocked for her failure at Cotillion. Her mother had only laughed, because it was just another weakness, admitting that she’d put her life and dignity on the line for a chance at freedom, not just for her, but for her crew as well. Now here she was, hearing the young, stupid king out, not just out of curiosity, but because part of her was desperately, foolishly hopeful that her failure hadn’t been in vain after all. Uma clenched her teeth and glared, daring him to mock her as well. But Ben only smiled, his eyes soft, and somehow that was worse.

“I know,” he said. “Anyway. The short story is, Evie and I want to bring more kids to Auradon.”

Uma snorted. “You inviting me?”

“If I thought you’d agree, then yes, I would invite you,” he said. “But I didn’t think you would right now. Am I wrong?”

Uma narrowed her eyes. He wasn’t wrong; if the guards had tried to pack her up into their limo right now, she’d have skewered them. Even if Harry and Gil had been invited, too (and there was no way Harry would be, not if Princess Evie had a hand in this), Uma would have said no. She wouldn’t accept the pity. Besides, even though her reputation had taken a blow, she was still on top of the heap, here. Let Ben take the little, pathetic, helpless ones. She didn’t need his charity. “Fine, so what do you want from me, then?”

Ben took a deep breath. “Our goal is to remove every child from the Isle and bring them to Auradon. But we can’t do that all at once. The Council will let us do six at a time, but no more.”

“That’s bullshit,” Uma snapped, unable to stop herself. “There are over five hundred kids here. They’ll all be grown by the time you get around to them – either that, or dead. Too little, too late, silly king.”

“Yeah,” he said heavily. “I know. Look, despite what you said before, being king doesn’t mean that I can just make decisions all by myself. Especially not right now. Until I turn eighteen, I have to negotiate with a whole bunch of other people, and believe me, I’ll keep advocating for us to bring more kids at a time. But in the meantime, I want to be able to give more resources to those still living on the Isle.”

“What resources?” she asked. “We already got the extra food. It’s great, but it’s not enough. My crew have to intercept the damn shipment every week just so some of the old folks don’t dump it all in the ocean on principle.” Having first dibs on the food was good, she wouldn’t lie, because it forced other Isle residents to barter with her. It also kept her mom off her back. But it also put them in the line of fire from scumbags like Madame Mim (who genuinely thought that good food was bad), and the Queen of Hearts (who just wanted it all for herself). In fact, she suspected that it was part of the reason why other gangs were trying to challenge her.

A smile tugged at his mouth. “I thought that might have been you.”

Uma gave him a flat look. “Well?”

He cleared his throat. “Well, for starters, I want to set up some kind of community centre.”

“What’s a community centre?” Gil asked, despite her firm instructions to stay silent.

Ben’s eyes flicked to him, and then back to Uma. “It would be kind of like a hub of people who provide different services. It would have beds and food, for kids who didn’t have a place to sleep. It would have a doctor. Maybe a therapist.”

“What the bleeding hell is a therapist?” Harry demanded.

“It … well, it’s a different kind of doctor. For the mind, rather than the body,” Ben said, clearly struggling to explain the concept.

Harry laughed. “My, you Auradon pricks have some strange ideas.”

“Enough,” Uma said sharply, silencing both Harry and Gil. The idea of having an actual doctor on the Isle (not a therapist one, whatever that was, a _real_ one) was genuinely useful. Uma couldn’t count how many times she’d had to stitch one of her crew mates up herself after a nasty brawl. And that was to say nothing of that time Harry returned from his father a few years ago, and she’d spent three days waiting and praying for him to recover. Still, it wasn’t that simple. “Look,” she told Ben, recapturing his attention. “You can put as many people here as you want, but they ain’t gonna last more than a week. If word gets out that a bunch of Auradon saps have set up shop, and they got food and drugs? They’ll be looted blind. If they’re lucky, that’s _all_ that will happen.”

Ben nodded. “Evie and the others said the same. Which is why I want to set it up on your territory.”

Uma stared at him. “You wanna what?”

“You’re a leader, Uma. I saw how much everyone on the Isle respects you – or fears you. If the centre was on your turf, people would know to stay away from it, right?”

Uma gaped, unable to form a proper sentence. No one had ever left her speechless before. Eventually, she said, “Even if I could, we’d become a target. Why would I put my people at risk for this?”

“Because it would benefit them,” Ben said. “And because I’d be paying you.”

Automatically, Uma bristled. “I don’t need your money.”

“That’s up to you, of course. But it’s not charity, okay? It’s a job.”

Uma tilted her head, considering. “What’s to stop me from hoarding this place all to myself?” she demanded. “Me and my crew get the food, beds, and medical attention. No one else does.”

Ben shrugged. “I’d have to trust that you wouldn’t turn away people who genuinely needed it. But even if a small percentage of people are getting the help, it’s better than nothing.”

“And if we’re constantly attacked?”

“I wouldn’t leave it all up to you. There would be guards stationed there to protect them. But I want to give it the best chance, and that means putting it somewhere already protected and respected. Somewhere safe.”

Uma tugged on the end of her braid, thinking fast. Harry and Gil were staring at her, wide-eyed, waiting for her to make a decision. They didn’t know what to do with an opportunity like this. Neither did she. He first instinct was to throw it back in the king’s face, tell him to shove it. But this wasn’t the same as an exclusionary ticket to Auradon. It was a resource that lots of people would benefit from, and who was she to deny them? Out of pride, no less? And honestly … Ben could have let her die. Mal would have incinerated her if he hadn’t jumped between them at Cotillion, pathetically begging for peace and harmony. She could have killed him, too. But somehow, they were both still alive, and Ben was again trying to reach out.

Uma had thought he was unbearably naïve at best, or a raging hypocrite at worst. Now … well, she still thought he was naïve. But he was also persistent. She had the notion that he really would get every child off the Isle if he committed to it. She glanced at Harry – beautiful, broken, furious, and loyal Harry. What would he have been, if given the chance? It might be too late for her, and maybe it was too late for him as well. But if there was even the slightest possibility that she could improve the lives of other kids like them here, on the Isle, wasn’t it worth giving it a try?

Uma glanced back at the screen, steeling herself. “I have conditions,” she said.

Ben’s face broke into a wide grin.

_

The guards left soon afterwards, but they let her keep the mirror tablet. Apparently it had a one-way connection to the king’s office, in case they needed to discuss business. _Discuss business_. Gods, what a crazy concept. The thing was heavier than it looked; she tucked it into her belt and made sure it was covered by her jacket.

Usually at the end of a long day, Uma like to kick back in her cabin with a glass of rum and Harry. Sometimes Gil joined them. In fact, one of her favourite down-time activities was watching the boys’ playful sparring turn into foreplay before joining in. Small pleasures, and all that. Tonight though, Uma needed time by herself to think. She left the boys to organise who was taking first watch, and climbed up to the crow’s nest. She leaned over the railing and looked out to see, where the dim, distant lights of Auradon were just visible through the mist. Uma had spent many nights glaring out at the mainland, feeling helplessly angry and desperate for revenge. Now, apparently, she had to look at it and remember that her _business partner_ was there.

Uma snorted and kicked the railing. There was no real partnership here. Ben was still the king, and she was just a subject with special treatment. She had to suck up her pride and accept that.

Harry found her when the moon was high in the sky, obscured by ever-present cloud and smog. “Evening,” he said, hauling himself up beside her. “You done brooding yet, or do we need to shack up here for the night?”

She raised an eyebrow at him. “You ain’t even wearing your jacket, Harry.”

“Well darn, silly me.” He shimmied in close to her. “You’ll have to keep me warm.”

Uma suppressed a smile. “Insubordinate. I oughta keel haul you.”

“Mmm, sounds fun.” He followed her gaze out to sea, and his face fell into a scowl. “We really doing this, then?”

She shrugged. “Got no real reason not to.”

“Here’s a reason: fuck ‘em.”

Uma laughed. “Tempting, but we’ve tried that. Hasn’t worked out great.”

“What are you talking about? Life’s marvellous!” He hopped up on the railing and spun around, hooking himself in the ropes to keep from falling. “We’re on top of the world!”

Up high, swaying lightly in the tide, Uma could almost believe him. But it was just an illusion. “We’re trapped, Harry. Even if we manage to live another decade, or rule the whole damn Isle, we’ll still be trapped. Just like your dad on Neverland.”

Harry scowled at the mention of his father and hopped down beside her. “He was just a crazy, bitter old man with nothing to live for except taking revenge on children. Me? I’ve got plenty to live for right here.” He touched her shoulder, almost hesitantly. “And I don’t want to lose her.”

Uma squeezed his hand. “No losses,” she reminded him. “Only gains. I promise.”

He grinned at her, only slightly mad, and she felt a small pang of shame at how weak it made her feel. Harry flirted with everyone he came into contact with, as easy as he breathed. But he only ever looked at _her_ like _that_.

“Come on,” she said, rubbing him briskly on the shoulder. “You’re freezing, you crazy idiot. Let’s get back inside.”

He smirked, looking smug, as if he’d won something. “As milady wishes.”

There were a lot of changes on the horizon, it seemed. But Uma felt pretty confident in saying that Harry Hook would never change. Uma had a feeling that she'd be taking plenty of comfort from that, in the coming months.


	3. Interview with a Villain

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Ben's recruitment panel gets hijacked and the most random collection of Disney characters are thrown together.
> 
> Warning for this chapter - brief reference to non-con.

When Ben had told the Council that he’d personally oversee the development and recruitment for this community centre on the Isle, he’d known it would be challenging. But certainly doable. Eager to get started as soon as possible, he held the first interview panel a week after it had been approved for the Council. Evie and Fairy Godmother were the other two panellists, although both of them had been busy drafting up a plan for bringing Evie’s six new children to Auradon, so the bulk of the work lay with him. Ben was fine with that. After all, he’d been balancing royal duties with school work since he was thirteen. He could handle one more project, especially one he was so passionate about.

The panel was to be conducted in his study. Ben had a whole wing of the dorms at Auradon Prep to himself, including the study, so he figured he may as well use it. He’d barely ever spent any time in it before his coronation, preferring to hang out with friends or the tourney team. However, these days he was holed up there more often than not.

Lucky for him, his friends had no problem with barging in to come and harass him or just lounge about the extra space, exasperating his secretary to no end.

“Wassap?” Jay said as he entered the room in such a fashion on Saturday morning, a full hour before interviews were supposed to begin. “Hey, where’s Phyllis?”

Ben grinned bemusedly. “She doesn’t work weekends. Why are you here so early on a Saturday?”

“What are you talking about, I’ve been up for hours. Just finished R.O.A.R. training.” Jay made himself at home in one of the plush, ornate chairs. He slid a Styrofoam cup of coffee across the desk, staining Ben’s documents with drops of brown liquid. “Thought you might need this.”

Ben studied the cup. “This is half-empty.”

“Wow, pessimist. Okay, so I might have had some. So, what?”

Ben accepted the drink. He’d barely had two hours of sleep the night before, so even half a cup of coffee was a welcome sight. “Thank you. But why are you here, again?”

“Recruitment? Duh.”

Ben paused. “You’re not on the panel, though.”

Jay scoffed. “You wanna know if Auradon folks can survive on the Isle? You gotta get the full experience.”

“Evie’s the Isle rep …”

“Yeah, yeah. Evie’s the smart one, don’t get me wrong, but she kinda sugar-coats things.” Jay yawned and settled into his chair with his eyes closed. “Wake me when the first victim arrives.”

And that, it seemed, was that. Ben knew he could have made Jay leave, if he really wanted to. But he didn’t want to. Instead, he continued to work on his notes and sip away at the coffee as Jay had his nap, idly trying to think of a convincing argument in case Fairy Godmother took issue with the extra panellists. At around 8:50, Carlos burst into the room, panting, his arms full of paper. Evie entered behind him at a more sedate, purposeful pace, clutching her own coffee, piled high with cream and froth.

“Now, Ben, I know we don’t want to overwhelm the applicants, but it wouldn’t hurt for the boys to be part of it,” she said, already all-business as she approached the desk. “As Carlos was just reminding me, I did live a fairly sheltered life on the Isle, all things considered.”

“I didn’t say sheltered,” Carlos said defensively. “I said you were just one person. I wasn’t trying to make it seem like you had it easy or anything.”

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m not offended.” She patted him on the head.

Ben glanced up at the door. “Is Mal on her way, too?”

Evie’s face went still in the way that meant she was trying very hard to mask her emotions. Carlos and Jay exchanged an awkward glance.

“…Ah. She didn’t want to be part of it,” he surmised.

Evie tossed her hair. “Mal has some reservations about the program. We had a little talk about it this morning.”

“She thinks we’re idiots,” Carlos said bluntly.

Ben winced. Mal had been sceptical enough about the program to begin with. Bringing Uma on board had been the final nail in the coffin. He’d tried to have a proper talk with her about it, but she’d been avoiding him for the past week and he just didn’t have time to chase her up. Besides, the others had advised him to give her space, at least until she could wrap her head around the whole Uma thing. Still, Ben looked forward to the opportunity to deal with this together. Avoiding problems had never worked out great for them in the past. “Are you okay?” he asked Evie, knowing how much it upset her when her best friend was upset.

Evie flashed him a quick smile. “Of course. She’ll come around. Now, shall we get started?”

Fairy Godmother arrived just as Jay and Carlos were fighting about where to sit. She pursed her lips in resignation, watching them roughhouse over the chair closest to Ben’s left-hand side. “Now, boys,” she cautioned. “We don’t want to scare anyone away before they’re even had a chance to start.”

“Sorry,” they both intoned, and Jay graciously let Carlos take the seat, choosing to sit on Evie’s other side.

Ben gave the principal a bashful smile. “The more the merrier?”

If there was one thing Fairy Godmother had learned over the last few months, it was how to choose her battles. She inclined her head in agreement, but gave them a stern look. “Ben and Evie are leading this interview, though. Understand?”

Jay and Carlos both agreed, but Ben suspected they would do what they wanted.

Interviews started at nine-thirty am. Fairy Godmother went to let their first applicant in – an older gentleman with an impeccably tailored suit and slicked-back hair. Out of the corner of his eye, Ben saw Jay immediately slouch back with his arms crossed.

(“Too fancy,” he muttered.)

(Evie elbowed him sharply. “It’s an interview, he’s supposed to look fancy!” she hissed.)

Ben ignored them and got up to shake the man’s hand. “Thank you for coming in. Doctor Williams, is it?”

The man nodded. “Doctor Theodore Williams, Your Highness. I am currently employed as the Charming family’s royal doctor.”

(“Great,” Carlos muttered. Fairy Godmother gave him a pointed look, and he ducked his head.)

Dr Williams went on to list the bulk of his experience, which seemed to consist of treating colds, viral infections, and Chad’s childhood injuries. He could see Carlos, Jay, and even Evie start to disengage, looking as if they’d already written him off. But Ben wanted to give the man a chance. Just because he _hadn’t_ worked in a place as brutal as the Isle didn’t mean he _couldn’t_. “So, what made you want to apply for this position?” he asked.

“Well, it would be a logical step forward in my career,” he said. “A change is just what I need.”

Before Ben could reply to that, Jay leaned forward. “What would you do if one of your patients pulled a knife on you and threatened to gut you?”

Dr Williams blinked rapidly for a moment, staring at Jay. “I … I beg your pardon?”

“Yeah, and then called you a privileged, do-gooder asshole,” Carlos added. “What would you do then?”

The man reared back as if he’d been struck across the face. Fairy Godmother made a sound in the back of her throat like a dying cat. Ben sighed and closed his eyes. “Guys …” he looked at Evie imploringly.

She considered the doctor for a moment, then leaned back and crossed her arms. “Answer the question,” she said.

After Doctor Williams had stormed out of the office, red-faced and scowling, Fairy Godmother rounded on the three VKs. “Those questions were completely inappropriate,” she scolded them.

Jay shrugged, unapologetic. “They were realistic. If the doc can’t handle a little bad language or a few threats, he’s not gonna last long on the Isle.”

“He’s got a point,” Ben said.

Fairy Godmother sighed. “Well, we’re not going to have much luck today.”

The next round of applicants were welcomed in, and then left again in quick succession. If he didn’t know any better, Ben would have thought that the VKs were going purely for shock value and sadistic amusement with their questions. But he did know better, and also knew that they had to be honest. He didn’t want to set anyone up to fail.

The questions ranged from the simple …

(“How would you reach out to kids who were really resistant?”)

(“Would you be upset if the kids don’t say please or thank you?”)

(“What would you do when different people under your roof started to fight with each other?”)

… To the upsetting.

(“Have you ever worked in a warzone?”)

(“What would you do during a siege?”)

(“What’s your experience working with kids who have been sexually assaulted?”)

When Evie got to this question, the applicant – a healing fairy from Audrey’s kingdom who had branched out into traditional medicine when the States were formed – burst into tears and had to be escorted out of the room by Fairy Godmother. Ben didn’t entirely blame her. As the morning dragged on and the questions continued, he felt an increasing urge to cry himself. Either that or break something. Evie, Carlos and Jay were perfectly calm, even casual, but that somehow only made it worse. He glanced at Fairy Godmother a few times, and could tell she was also feeling a bit shaken.

“Are you okay?” Carlos asked him quietly at one point, while Fairy Godmother went to get the next applicant and Evie and Jay argued over some incident that happened years ago.

Ben looked at him in surprise. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

Carlos just frowned at him in concern. “You look kind of sick.”

Ben rubbed a hand over his face, feeling ashamed. “Nah, I’m not sick. Just ... you know, tired. Thanks for asking, though.”

Carlos half-smiled and pushed him gently on the shoulder. “Don’t want you breaking down on us.”

The new applicant entered before he could reply, and proved to be a very effective distraction. He was a very tall, very broad-chested black man with a friendly smile. Ben’s brow furrowed as he stood up to shake his hand. “I know you, don’t I?”

“You surely do. The name’s Sweet. Joshua Sweet.” He grinned. “I worked on board the ship during your family’s diplomatic envoy to Atlantis a few years back. You were only about yay big though, Your Highness,” he indicated with a hand somewhere close to his waist, a pretty fair estimate of Ben pre-growth spurt.

“Right, of course.” He remembered Doctor Sweet’s booming laugh. He also remembered him punching a sea monster square in the face when they’d been attacked during the envoy. He suddenly felt a lot more hopeful about this. “It’s good to see you again. Here, let me introduce you to my friends; this is Evie, my royal councillor. And this is Jay and Carlos.”

“Pleasure to meet each of you,” Dr Sweet said, leaning forward to shake their hands. Carlos looked a little bewildered by this. “I gotta say, I’m glad you’re all here. I need the full lowdown on this place if I’m gonna work there, you get my drift?”

“Of course,” Evie said, smiling widely. “Let’s get started.”

Dr Sweet’s interview went on for much longer than the others. Part of this was because he was actually able to answer their questions, and partly because he started telling personal adventure stories that went on and on for ages. His over-the-top enthusiasm was a little overwhelming at times, but it was the perfect antidote to what they’d been discussing before he arrived. Ben was almost sorry to end the interview.

“I think I’m in love,” Evie swooned after he’d left.

“What? You’ve already got Doug, don’t be greedy,” Carlos said, looking offended.

“Doug will understand.”

“So …” Ben raised his eyebrows. He felt really good about Dr Sweet, but they’d shot down his opinions before. “Can we put him on the ‘strong maybe’ list?”

“No, because I want to keep him,” Evie said. “But in all seriousness, I do think he would be a good fit. Emotionally intelligent _and_ able to crush a pineapple with his bare hands? Yes, perfect.”

“And he didn’t let me steal his watch,” Jay added, looking satisfied.

Ben paused. “Have you been pickpocketing every applicant who we’ve interviewed?”

He scoffed. “Nah, I didn’t waste my time with most of them.”

The rest of the afternoon went by in a blur, with one or two standout applicants. One was (surprisingly) Grumpy the dwarf. He grunted his way through most of the questions, but still somehow managed to demonstrate more competence than most of the others combined. He even grudgingly accepted a hug from Evie before leaving. As for the very last applicant … well, Ben could safely say none of them were expecting a giant, talking black panther to slink into the room. Carlos yelped and jumped up onto Ben’s desk when he entered. The panther just sat back on his haunches and gave them all an unimpressed look.

“I teach mancubs respect,” was his main pitch. “And I eat those who would harm them.”

Ben couldn’t argue with that logic.

When the day finally came to an end, Ben didn’t know quite how to feel. On the one hand, three hopeful applicants were better than none, considering how hard the job was going to be. On the other hand, it wasn’t enough. They needed at least four people to work in this centre – a doctor, a therapist, an outreach worker, and a caretaker. That wasn’t counting the administrative staff and security detail. Ben had been approved for five Auradon guards to protect the centre, but it was still a huge risk to the workers. There was safety in numbers, after all – Evie had taught him that.

Besides that, he still felt emotionally wrung out by the entire interview. The others seemed fine, though. He watched them leave the office, talking and laughing with each other. “Evie tried to wave Ben over, too. “We’re getting dinner! You coming?”

“I just gotta finish something. I’ll catch up.”

“Okay, we’ll grab Mal on the way! Hopefully she’s done sulking!”

Ben waved them off, and then went to sit back at his desk. The room was getting dark, late sunset light creeping in through the window. That was fine. Maybe it was the Beast in him, but sometimes he just needed to brood in the shadows for a while.

Every time he thought the Isle couldn’t get any worse, then one of his friends would come out with something – a casual statement, or a horrible story, it could be anything – and he’d be reminded all over again that it could always get worse. Even if the stuff they’d talked about in the interview had been general, rather than personal experiences, didn’t help. It could have been them. It could be Uma and her crew. It could be _anyone._

Not for the first time, Ben wondered if he was doing enough. It always felt so important to negotiate and compromise with everyone, but maybe he should throw subtlety to the wind and fight harder. Even if it got him nowhere, didn’t he at least owe it to them to try?

His office door creaked open. “Your Majesty?” Fairy Godmother said.

“Just call me Ben, please,” he croaked, not looking up from his hands.

“Ben. Why are you sitting here in the dark? Honestly you look just like your father,” she scolded, switching on the lights.

_His father_. The man who raised him, guided him, loved him. The man who let an entire generation of children grow up in a prison. Ben would find it easier to be angry, if it were just him. But it was all of them – all the kings, queens and heroes, and Fairy Godmother, herself. Each of them were good people but somehow, they’d all let this bad thing happen. And Ben had let it happen, too, for far too long.

Ben loved his father, but he really, really didn’t want to be like him.

“You’ll be pleased to know,” Fairy Godmother was saying. “I heard back from my friend. She’s agreed to take on the position of team leader for the Island Community Centre.”

“Your friend?” he asked. He vaguely remembered them having this conversation, but the details escaped him.

“Yes, Merryweather. I believe you’ve met her?”

Of course. One of the Three Good Fairies from Audrey’s kingdom, and her favourite honorary aunt. Ben had met Merryweather the last time he’d visited Audrey’s castle. She’d seemed like a good match for their centre – steadfast, no-nonsense, and kind. He smiled tiredly. “That’s great.”

Fairy Godmother clasped her hands together, giving him a knowing look. “King Ben, who don’t you go join your friends? Or go to your bedroom and get some sleep. It’s been a long day.” She shuddered slightly. “A really, _really_ long day.”

Ben winced. “I know it didn’t go as easy as it could have done,” he began, thinking of the blunt questions and difficult topics. “I just thought …”

“No, no. It was very honest. A little confronting, I’ll admit, but necessary.” She smiled sweetly. “You don’t need to apologise for your friends, Ben. They’re being true to themselves, and they want to do the right thing. You’re all doing such a good job, and I’m very proud of you.”

Ben glanced down at his hands, clasped on the table. “Fairy Godmother, do you ever regret creating the Isle?”

The principal’s smile froze on her face. It took her a few, long moments to answer. “No, Ben. I don’t. The villains were unstoppable. Even the ones who died – Maleficent, Jafar, Ursula – they all found a way back, stronger than ever. And the damage they caused … so many lives lost. So much hurt. We had to do whatever it took to put a stop to it. And it worked. The many kingdoms of Auradon have been safe ever since, although you know how much we’re still recovering.”

Ben had heard this story many times before. He didn’t doubt the truth of it for a moment. But it wasn’t the whole truth; there was one small, dark and ugly piece of it that they’d all turned their backs on for so long. “The children, though,” he said. “Do you regret what happened to them?”

Fairy Godmother’s face scrunched up. “I do. And I support everything you put in place to help them. But I still don’t know what we could have done differently, to save the kingdoms and create Auradon. Give you kids a chance to grow up in peace and prosperity.”

Ben was silent, his stomach rolling with guilt. He knew that he got that chance at the expense of Mal, Uma, and countless others.

“If you can tell me what we could have done different,” Fairy Godmother continued. “I would love to hear it. I really, truly would. Because I don’t ever want to be a part of something like that ever again.”

“Me, either,” Ben said.

She smiled and squeezed his shoulder. “I don’t believe you ever would be, Ben.”


	4. Allies and Alliances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uma shops for real estate. Mal and Harry express some concerns. A mysterious new gang rears its head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for the comments guys :)

Life had been so much better since Ben told Mal she was allowed to hiss at the paparazzi. Actually, life had been better in general since Cotillion. She was more secure in her relationship with Ben, she was closer to her friends, and she basically wore whatever the hell she wanted outside of formal events. Positive self-expression, plus being able to let off a little steam on people who deserved it, meant that Mal was in a pretty good mood most days.

It was this, and _only_ this, that had stopped her from transforming into a dragon on a daily basis, ever since her boyfriend (pre-pre-fiancé, actually, apparently, and no Mal still didn’t want to think too hard about that, thanks very much) had announced his intention to work closely with the woman who had kidnapped him, love-spelled him, and tried to drown his entire royal court.

“Woman? Seriously, Mal,” Evie told her when she complained about it for the fifth time that week. “She’s your age.”

“Mom told me she’s six months older than me, and that’s not the point!” Mal said, pacing back and forth across their room.

Evie raised her eyebrow. “How about the fact that you also love-spelled him?” she asked. “With our help, I might add. Is that a fair point to make?”

Mal stopped and looked at her, hurt. “That’s not fair, Evie. I know that was a mistake. I’ve said sorry. You really think _Uma_ is over there feeling bad? No! She’s stewing and brooding and scheming about her next plan to take over Auradon. And Ben’s just gonna hand it to her on a silver platter!”

“Well, not a silver platter.” She bent back down over her sewing machine. “Maybe a cheese board.”

In a fit of pique, Mal swept her hand over the pile of new commission items on Evie’s bed, throwing them to the floor. Her best friend gaped in offence as Mal spun around to glare at her, eyes flashing green. “I don’t care what you call it! It’s stupid, and you’re both being idiots!”

“Mal! Please calm down!” Evie rushed towards her, trying to grab both of her hands and hold them still. “Look, I’m not thrilled about it either. But if it’s the only way we can make this happen, then I’m willing to put aside our grievances. I really do think Uma will play nice, at least for a little while. She has so much more to lose than us.”

Mal snorted, pulling away. “How does a shrimpy little chip shop waitress with a pretend-play pirate crew have more to lose than a king?”

Evie made a pained face. “Mal, come on. You remember what it was like on the Isle. I know I do … even though I tried so hard to forget it, before you went back there. Every day feels like it could be your last. Your life is always on the line. And Uma has a whole bunch of people to be worried about, not just herself or a small group, like we did. I’m sure she feels that fear, too.”

Mal didn’t say anything. Evie was right; sometimes it did feel like every day was her last. But other times, she’d felt on top of the world. Not for the first time, Mal realised just how different her experience had been from the others.

“And, look,” Evie said. “You don’t have to like this any more than I do. But please, _please_ , don’t run back there again, okay? At least not without telling me.”

Mal looked into Evie’s eyes, wide and dark and sincere. There were days when she thought she could get lost in those eyes. They made her do all sorts of stupid things, like back down from a fight. She looked at the pile of clothes on the floor, and felt guilty for her outburst. “I won’t,” she said quietly. “I’m pissed, but I’m not going anywhere. You and Ben do what you gotta do, I guess. When it all falls to shit, I’ll be there.”

Evie made a face, as if that was close to what she wanted to hear, but not quite. Nonetheless, she pulled Mal into a quick, tight hug. “This will work, okay? I know it.”

Mal managed to hug her back. “If anyone can do the impossible, it’s you,” she said. “But you have to be careful. Don’t trust her for a second. And look after Ben.” _He’s too good for any of them,_ she thought, but didn’t say. Evie would only tell her she was projecting, and Mal already knew that.

_

The day was hot, humid and muggy. The worst possible time to be wandering around the streets, searching for something halfway-worthwhile amongst the dirty buildings. Uma was already aware of this, but Harry still saw fit to complain about it every five minutes. He complained about the weather, the task at hand, and the way Gil’s feet plodded along the ground, along with countless other things.

“Look, would you shut up?” she finally snapped. “The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can go back to the ship.”

He scowled and hunched his shoulders up around his ears. Uma sighed. He’d been in an absolutely atrocious mood for the last week since their video call with King Ben. For most people, Harry in a bad mood meant temper tantrums and random acts of violence. For Uma, it meant dealing with him being a whiny little bitch. She was over it.

“Hey, what about this one?” Gil asked, pointing to a dilapidated structure on the corner of _Struggle Street._ “It’s big enough.”

“You mince-brain,” Harry snapped. “It’ll fall down around their bloody ears.”

“I thought you wanted that?” Gil said, confused.

“I do!” Harry said, swinging his hook around. “They can all be buried in rubble for all I care!”

Uma pinched the bridge of her nose. This was ridiculous. “Harry. If you can’t cope with this, why don’t you meet us back at the ship?”

In an instant, his attitude changed. He swept his hat off and clasped his wrists together beseechingly. “No, I’ll be good. Don’t send me away.”

Uma narrowed her eyes at him. When he got like this – contrary, belligerent, and needy – she knew there was usually something else going on. He didn’t cope very well with change, for one thing. Or boredom. Or people from his past coming around to cause trouble. In this case, it didn’t take a genius to figure out what the problem was; it wore a crown, and threatened to bring lots of big changes to their little world. But he would never admit it. “Do you have a specific problem that you wanna bring up, or …?”

He leaned against a nearby wall, slouching down to her level. “Why are we doing all this legwork? Why doesn’t the _King_ ,” he spat, somehow making the word ‘king’ sound like ‘maggot’. “Get his arse over here and build his own bloody building, if he’s so good?”

“He offered. I told him he was an idiot. You think anyone’s gonna voluntarily visit somewhere that looks like it belongs to Auradon?” She gestured to one of the nearby propaganda posters, depicting Mal with a noose around her neck, and another one with King Beast missing his eyes and tongue. The original colours had faded somewhat, but the bright yellow and pastel blues still clashed horribly with the rest of the street. “People have _standards_ , Harry. We need to make it look as inconspicuous as possible.”

He rolled his eyes. “Whatever.”

“Okay, so if that’s all, please stop being an ass and help me find a place, okay? They wanna start setting up shop next week.”

He perked up with interest. “They’re coming here? The king, too?”

Uma shrugged, already moving ahead to catch up with Gil. “That’s what he said.”

“So, it would be the perfect opportunity to nab him again,” Harry steepled his fingers against his hook, grinning widely. “All it would take is for us to just lure him away from his little entourage, ‘oh, your majesty, look at this lovely little spot right here!’ and then we just …” He slashed his hook through the air. Uma caught his wrist, glaring.

“Keep your voice down!” she hissed. “We’re not kidnapping the king!”

Harry pulled his arm away, a little rougher than he normally would. “Come on, Uma! It would be so easy! Your plan could work this time.”

“Harry. Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results is nothing but a sign of madness. It’s not happening.”

He scowled. “So we’re just playing his game then, are we? No grander plan in the works? At all?”

She tilted her head to the side. “Well, maybe later. I’m not ruling it out, okay? If this goes nowhere, we’ll have plenty of opportunities to plan a proper escape. But I’m not shooting myself in the foot again with a half-assed kidnapping or love spell plot. For the time being, we are on our best behaviour.” She gave him a stern look. “Am I clear?”

His shoulders slumped. “Yes, Captain.”

They walked in silence for a while longer, but she could feel his displeasure rolling off him like mist on the ocean. It was almost a relief when his attention was caught by something off to the side. “What the bleeding hell?” Harry muttered. He darted over to a small pub on the corner, Uma and Gil following closely behind.

“What is it?” Uma said. Harry was closely examining one of the bricks. He beckoned her forward to take a closer look, and then she saw it; a tiny symbol carved into the mortar. It was unfamiliar to her, some kind of stylised circle with a few dashes through it. His eyes were good; she’d never have spotted it from so far away.

“This,” Harry seethed, pointing his hook at the symbol. “Is what I caught that Hun prick messing around with. This one’s new.”

Uma narrowed her eyes. “Someone didn’t learn their lesson, then.”

Harry pushed himself off the wall and sauntered around to the pub’s entrance.

“What are you doing?” Uma asked.

“I’m just going to ask these fine folk if they’ve been solicited by another protection racket,” Harry said, smiling. Uma waved her hand, letting him go for it. She usually left that kind of business up to him. She had an image to maintain, after all. While he was in there, she turned to study the symbol again. She still had no idea what it meant.

“Maybe it’s letters,” Gil said suddenly, surprising her.

“How’d you figure?”

He traced it with his finger. “See, maybe this is an O. And this is an A. But they’re, like, on top of each other.

Ume raised her eyebrows, impressed. Gil wasn’t a great reader (his dad had never let him learn), but Bonnie, one of her crew members, had been trying to teach him lately. He was clearly mastering at least some of the basics. “Hmm, maybe. Wonder what it stands for.”

He shrugged, having reached the end of his inspiration. Inside the pub, there was a sound of shattered glass, and a couple of alarmed yelps. Harry exited moments later, flipping the hook in his hand smugly. Uma and Gil fell into step with him as he left.

“Well?” she asked.

“They did indeed receive a visit. Some girl showed up, made a few threats, told them not to say anything. Etcetera.”

“Shan Yu’s gang?”

Harry frowned. “The description didn’t fit. They said she was dressed like a pirate, but wouldn’t say whose crew.”

“Your dad?” Uma asked, scrunching her nose.

He scoffed. “ _His_ crew’s nothing more than a bunch of drunken old morons. They don’t have the power or the brains to start a turf war.”

“May not stop them from trying,” she pointed out.

“It ain’t him!” Harry snapped. At Uma’s surprised look, he dropped his gaze. “Captain. Just trust me on this, alright?”

She eyed the way he crossed his arms tightly, the nails on one hand digging into the crook of his other elbow. The hook trembled faintly, making little zigzags of light as it caught the low-hanging sun. Uma stilled it with her own hand, looking him straight in the eye. “I wouldn’t make you go back,” she said quietly. “Not for information, not for nothing. Okay?”

He glanced at her, gave a small half-smile, and then shook his head. “I really don’t think it’s him.”

“Okay,” she said, accepting that. There weren’t that many pirate crews on the Isle, but no one knew Hook better than Harry did. “Then who the hell was she representing?”

Harry scratched the back of his head. “Something called ‘Original Alliance’, apparently.”

Uma thought of the letters on the wall. OA. That checked out. “Great, so who are they supposed to be? Who’s in charge?”

“Well, the idiot behind the bar knew nothing.”

“That makes no sense! Why would people bow to the whims of some mysterious group with no rep, no known acts of villainy to their name, and no leader?”

“And no incentives,” Harry pointed out. “It’s not like they’re giving out food or anything, the way you do.”

Uma growled and stalked back towards her ship. This was the last thing she needed.

“Uh,” Gil said uncertainly. “Should we tell the king?”

“No!” she snapped, stopping both of them in her tracks. She grimaced, embarrassed by her own reaction. If she told Ben that someone was challenging her territory, he’d put the centre on hold. Besides, it would make her look weak, and she didn’t want him, of all people, to think that. “No, we can handle it. These people haven’t actually done anything yet – for all we know, it’s a bunch of stupid children.”

“So what do you suggest we do, Captain?” Harry asked.

Uma though for a moment. “We post sentries in the street. Word up the local businesses, tell them to keep an eye out. If we see anyone suspicious, tail them. But no brawling, got it? Any info comes back to me before we take action.”

Harry grinned, looking much more like himself at the prospect of a potential gang conflict. “As you wish.”

While Harry went to talk to the crew, Gil said, “Hey, about the centre.”

“What?” Uma said, feeling tired and annoyed.

“What about the old school?”

“School? What?” Uma hadn’t been to school in almost two years, and she’d only lasted that long to get out of doing shifts at her mom’s shop. Most of her crew hadn’t attended since they were about eleven. It was mostly for little kids whose parents wanted a break. She’d barely though about the place in years.

“Yeah, I mean. Barely anyone goes to school anymore, so there’s plenty of rooms free. And it’s technically on your turf, but it’s also kind of seen as neutral? So more people might go there if they were in trouble.”

Uma considered this for a moment. “That’s … not actually a bad idea, Gil.”

He grinned, happy to receive the praise.

Uma felt a little bit better as they boarded the ship. The king should be pleased.

Not that Uma cared about pleasing him, or anything. She had better things to worry about, like rival factions, mysterious enemies, her first mate’s mental stability, and somehow staying on top of this damn crab bucket of an island for as long as it took to see some real change.

Uma waited until she was in a private area before taking the mirror tablet out and firing it up. A pixelated view of Ben’s office came into view, slowly becoming clearer as it buffered. “Hey, your majesty,” she greeted mockingly as soon as Ben’s face was more than a pale, boxy smudge. “We’ve got your place.”

_

Mal didn’t feel any better after her talk with Evie. She complained about the whole situation to Jay and Carlos too, but they had even less patience with her than Evie did, and Carlos rightly called her on the fact that she was talking to all the wrong people. If she really wanted to feel less angry, she’d just bite the bullet and stop avoiding her boyfriend. But Mal wanted to hold on to her anger. It made her feel righteous, and therefore better than Uma.

Jay ended up pushing her out of the room by the shoulders, aiming her in the vague direction of Ben’s wing. “Go. Communicate. If you’re still feeling murder-y afterwards, then we’ll revisit the situation.”

“When he gets kidnapped again, I’m blaming you!” she said, but he just blew her a kiss and shut the door firmly in her face.

Mal huffed, storming off. She never had to deal with such _blatant disrespect_ like this on the Island.

Eventually, Mal caved. She went to find Ben after the community centre workers had been officially hired (ha. Community centre on the Isle of the Lost. What a concept). He was working late in his office, as per usual these days, and she wondered suddenly if he was avoiding her as much as she’d been avoiding him. Well, that just wouldn’t do. Mal couldn’t hear him talking to anyone through the door, so she knocked once to give him some warning, and then let herself inside.

Ben glanced up, looking both happy and surprised, but mostly surprised. And a little wary, if she wasn’t mistaken. That, more than anything, made her feel guilty.

“Mal! Hey. I, uh. I wasn’t expecting you.” He stood up and started shuffling the papers on his desk into a neater pile. As if Mal cared about his organisation skills.

“Hey,” she said flatly. “Came to talk. Hope that’s okay.”

He stumbled around the desk to stand before her, smiling. “Of course. I’m so happy to see you.” He pulled her close and kissed her. “I’m so sorry I haven’t spent much time with you lately. Things have been crazy.”

The guilt intensified. He was always with the apologies. “Don’t sweat it. My fault.”

He pulled back and gave her a knowing look. “You okay?”

Man, when he wasn’t with the apologies, he was with the _reassurances._ “Sure. Great. Why not?”

“Well, you’re kind of talking in monosyllables and it’s scaring me a little bit.” He leaned back against his desk, his hands in his pockets like a real-life miniature businessman. “What did you want to talk about?”

Oh, hell. Mal put her head in her hands and sighed. “You know I’m pissed, right?”

“Yeah. I got that.”

“And you know I think this is a bad plan, and it will implode at any minute?”

He _hmm’d_. “Yeah, I understand that, too.”

Mal crossed her arms. She’d spent hours ranting and raving to her friends. She was too tired to do it to Ben, as well. “This is really important to you, isn’t it?”

“It is, yeah.”

“Why?”

He looked thrown by the question. Mal was used to the expression, but it still rankled. “Because they’re my people too, Mal. And every day I do nothing, the more they suffer.”

She shook her head, feeling out of her depth. It wasn’t that she didn’t care about people. On the contrary, she cared _deeply_ about the ones she loved, to the point where she’d kill and die for them. But caring about people she didn’t know at all, let alone those who would cause her harm? Mal didn’t understand that. Ben and Evie did. Maybe they had bigger spaces in their hearts, or maybe they were just less broken than her, or they just had a royal responsibility that was totally genetic. But even Uma cared for strangers, in her own weird, brutal way, and that got Mal’s goat more than anything.

Mal sighed again. She was a villain, through and through. She’d accepted that there were certain things about the world – particularly life in Auradon – that she would never understand. It helped to remind herself of the things she _did_ know, intimately and absolutely. She knew Ben. She knew Evie, Jay, and Carlos. She would do whatever it took to keep them safe and happy.

Right now, as much as it pained her, letting Ben play nice with Uma and the Isle kids made him happy. Until it all fell down, she would just have to accept that.

“You’re a good person, Ben,” she told him. “I just don’t want to see you get hurt.”

Ben smiled. “When I’ve got you and the guys to look out for me? No way.”

Mal let him hold her, closed her eyes, and pretended for a moment that his faith could hold up the universe.


	5. Return to the Isle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The king returns to the Ilse, and things get slightly messy.

The day finally dawned, dark and humid beneath a cloud of smog. Uma stood on the dock as the Auradon ship arrived, Harry on her left and Gil on her right, both of them a half-step behind. Harry was radiating his displeasure, while Gil was positively vibrating with excitement. Uma tried to ignore both of them. She herself was feeling anxious, but she didn’t dare show it. She had a reputation, and today, it was more important than ever.

When the shiny Auradon ship emerged before them, prow-first through the mist, she felt their tension in her own shoulders. Part of her ran through wild scenarios in which she jumped the ship, took the king hostage, and took over Auradon. Despite her warnings to Harry (and a few other crew members who thought they were cute), it was so easy, and so satisfying, to contemplate the fantasy.

Uma kept these thoughts to herself as the ship docked. As King Ben himself came into view against the railing, she felt the tension and the dark fantasy leave her in a quick rush. She had a job to do. They all did. Nothing would jeopardize that under her watch.

“Uma,” Ben said, grinning like an idiot as he dismounted the ship and approached her on the dock. “It’s good to see you again.”

Uma quirked an eyebrow, and eyed him up and down before accepting his hand to shake. “I literally saw your face four hours ago.”

They’d spoken via mirror-tablet a lot over the past couple of weeks. Mostly it was to discuss the centre or the kids who were next in line to be relocated, but she did have a little game where she tried to catch him while Mal was in the office. It hadn’t happened yet; she’d seen Evie a couple of times, as well as Carlos de Vil (who’d given her a truly impressive death stare behind Ben’s back) and that dumbass Fairy Godmother. Mal was never there, so Uma had yet to infuriate her.

Ben’s smile turned sheepish. Behind him, guards and workmen started carrying items aboard the docks – furniture, boxes, tools and other equipment. Uma could feel Harry watching this occur with his keen gaze, so she felt safe enough to give Ben her full attention as he replied, “Not in person, though. Maybe I’m being old-fashioned, but seeing someone in person isn’t the same as seeing them in a small screen.”

Uma snorted. “You _are_ old-fashioned.”

“Yeah, my friends keep telling me that.”

_Friends._ Mal, Jay, Carlos and Evie. Uma felt her smile slide away. “They not here to join you?” she demanded. “Or protect you?”

Ben shrugged one shoulder. “Not this time. I promised them I could look after myself for a couple of hours, assuming all goes okay.” His eyes flicked over her shoulder, at Harry and Gil. “Is everything okay?”

Uma sighed. “Harry,” she said shortly, tossing the name over her shoulder without breaking eye contact with Ben. “Show these fine gentlemen to their new workplace, would you?”

Harry grumbled distinctly in her ear, but obeyed. By unspoken agreement, Gil followed. That left Uma and Ben almost-alone in the docks, appraising each other in the dim light of the midday sun.

“So,” Uma said,

“So, um,” Ben said at the exact same time.

Despite herself, Uma huffed a laugh. It was kind of a relief, for him to feel as awkward as her. They turned to walk beside each other, following along behind their respective crews. She saw him looking up at her ship as they passed by. The last time he’d been here, she nearly made him walk the plank. It had felt like such a victory at the time, to have him as hostage while Mal and her friends watched from the dock, helplessly livid. She never would have guessed that they’d be here, now, walking side by side in pursuit of a common goal. “Bad memories?” she asked idly.

He hummed noncommittally. “I learned a lot on that ship.”

“Were you even slightly scared?” she asked.

“Of course I was.”

She huffed. “You didn’t look it.”

“Eh, I’m good at maintaining a straight face while screaming internally. That’s kind of what politics are all about.” He glanced at her. “Besides, I knew you didn’t want me dead. You had a different goal in mind besides drowning me.”

“I’m not gonna apologise,” she warned him, though he hadn’t asked. “Not for that, anyway. I saw an opportunity to leave this place, so I took it. But …” she trailed off, wondering if the next part would be admitting weakness. Oh well, too late now. “Look, the love spell thing was low. I wouldn’t do that again.”

He smiled, looking faintly bemused but pleased all the same. “Okay. I appreciate that.”

They walked in silence for a while longer.

“I don’t think Harry likes me very much,” Ben confessed.

Uma snorted. “What gave it away?”

“Well, he keeps looking at me like he wants to skewer me over a barbeque,” Ben observed. As if on cue, Harry, glanced back over his shoulder, his eyes flickering darkly between the king and his captain. Uma lifted her chin, challenging him, and he turned away with a pout.

“I’d be flattered,” she said to Ben. “Harry Hook’s got quite the rep for skewering, round here.”

Ben went slightly red, but to her surprise, he chuckled slightly. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

She would have teased him some more, but Harry’s overprotective, slightly insane look reminded her again of Mal. “What does your little girlfriend say about all this, anyway?”

Ben got a faraway look in his eyes. He really was too trusting; Uma spotted four different opportunities to attack and subdue him in the five minutes it took to get to their destination. “Mal thinks I’m dumb,” he said genially. “So I said I’d check in with her after an hour, to help her worry less.”

He couldn’t have spelled it out any clearer; people were watching him, and he had to take care of his safety while here on the island. Feeling oddly affronted by this, Uma said, “I worded everyone up. No one’s gonna cause any trouble.” _Not today, at least,_ she thought quietly to herself.

He shot her a grateful smile. “Thanks, Uma.”

“I didn’t do it for you,” she said, nettled.

Ben smiled again, bowing his head in acceptance. They continued in silence for a while. It was easy to walk beside him, not before him or behind. People stared openly as they passed, but with the Auradon guards and most of Uma’s crew present, no one bothered them. This turned out to be a blessing, because Ben kept _smiling_ at people, or trying to wave at them, and all it was utterly infuriating.

“Would you stop that?” she snapped, batting his arm down when she could take no more.

“What?” He was honestly confused. As if making eye contact with people and baring your teeth was a normal fucking thing where he came from. “Stop what?”

“Stop … interacting with everyone,” she said. “It’s weird. And kind of threatening.”

“Oh.” He squeezed his hands behind his back, looking crestfallen. “Sorry. I was just trying to be friendly.”

Uma sighed and rolled her eyes. “You really just act that way around everyone?”

“Uh, yeah? It’s literally one of the first things I learned. If you’re going outside where people are watching, you smile and wave.”

Uma gave him a horrified look. “Wow. And you think we’re fucked up?” She meant it ironically, but it came out sounding sincerely concerned. Maybe Ben’s life had been bliss compared to hers, but at least she could be honest when she hated someone. Being nice to a bunch of strangers for no reason at all, especially when they’d sooner drag you through the mud than help you (and she’d seen the passive-aggressive news reports, she knew exactly how those reports loved to pick on any little issue they could find with the royals); that sounded like the worst hell she could imagine.

Ben just shrugged. “I’m the king. Before, that, I was the crown prince. I have a responsibility to present myself a certain way.”

Well, Uma could sympathise with that, if nothing else. It occurred to her that Ben’s outward niceness was similar to her outward meanness; both a front, a form of armour in a dangerous world. Ben _was_ genuinely nice, sure, but she caught herself wondering what else was lurking beneath all that.

When they reached the school, Ben’s eyes lit up. Uma couldn’t see why. The place was a total dump, not like the literal _castle_ where he attended classes.

“This is great,” he said. “You guys found the perfect place.”

“You’re not the one who has to work here,” Uma reminded him.

Ben winced. “I know. They’ll add their own touch to it, I’m sure.”

“When are they supposed to start?”

“As soon as this place is liveable, I guess,” he said, looking around the interior corridors. Half the building had been sectioned off for the centre, while the other half would still be for the school kids. “Maybe next week? So long as that’s cool with you.”

Uma shrugged. “Makes no difference to me.”

“It’s just, I know I’m not familiar with all the … dynamics and stuff around here. You would know, better than anyone, how best to integrate something like this into the community.”

Uma gave him a sharp look. “You know I’m not like, a mayor, right? I run a pirate crew – a gang. We operate on fear, okay, that’s the only “dynamic” at play here.”

He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, looking suddenly tired. “I know. The guys explained that to me. Look, if I could put some kind of Auradon-run governing body on the Isle that could make all of this happen, then I would. But I don’t have the authority or the resources to do it right, and if I don’t do it right, then it’s just gonna cause all kinds of conflict here that puts _everyone_ at risk.”

Uma said nothing, but she knew what he meant. More Auradon presence on the Isle would mean more guards, and the villains wouldn’t accept that. Most of the old folks– the villains – didn’t care about making things ‘better’. They wanted to escape, and if that wasn’t an option, then they’d do whatever it took to remain on top of the heap. So many of them were shells of their former selves, but they could still be dangerous, if given the chance. And every single person on this rock was angry. If Ben here made one wrong move, it could ignite a full-on riot.

“Believe me, Uma,” Ben continued. “Relying on youth gang politics just to get people the services they need is _not_ the way I want to work. But right now, I have to prioritise whatever will make kids safer. And I think you’re the same.”

“How’d you figure that?”

He half-smiled. “You might not be a mayor, or anything. But you’re a good person. That’s more important.”

Uma stepped away from him abruptly. She had a feeling in her chest, and it was too big and bright to sit comfortably. “You don’t know me very well,” she said thickly.

“Well no, not yet. I’d like to, though.”

Uma scowled, not looking him in the eye. Ben wasn’t flirting with her, which was good, because she’d punch him if he tried. But he had a kind of genuine charm to him that made everything he said sound like a damn marriage proposal. No wonder Mal and her stupid little gang were head-over-heels for him. If Uma had less anger within her, towards him and everything he represented, she might have been a little bit infatuated as well.

“Let’s just get on with this, okay? I’ve got other shit to do today.”

He inclined his head and followed her back to where the workers had started to set things up. Gil had decided to include himself in this, and was carrying wooden beams, cans of paint, and power tools to where they needed to go. When he saw Uma watching, he tried to show off by carrying more than one thing at a time, his muscles bulging with the effort. Uma sighed in fond exasperation. Suddenly, his proud grin fell as one of the open paint cans on his shoulder started to wobble.

Ben darted forward to catch it before it could fall, white paint splashing over the rim. “Woah! It’s cool, I got it.”

“Thanks, man,” Gil said. “Uh, I mean. Your highness? Your majesty?”

“Ben’s fine,” the king said.

“Nice look,” Uma said, trying not to laugh at the splatters of paint in his hair and all across the front of his very expensive-looking suit.

“Yeah, Evie’s gonna kill me. She told me to wear something else if I was gonna get messy.” He shrugged out of his blazer. “Ah, well, I’m here now.”

He got stuck into some of the painting, patiently listening to Gil’s chatter as he worked. Uma watched as the space slowly came together, and couldn’t help but feel a spark of hope. This would be a good thing, she decided. A total pain in the ass and risky as hell, but, still. It was something new and good, and she’d helped make it happen.

Harry came to stand by her at one point, after keeping an eye on things outside. He glared at Ben, was now covered in about six different paint colours, laughing along with some of the workers as well as Uma’s crew.

“Can I …?” Harry asked.

“Still no, Harry,” Uma said, quashing his violent aspirations before they could manifest. She turned to look at him. “All good on the street?”

He nodded. “No sign of our new friends.”

“Yet.” So far, the so-called ‘Original Alliance’ hadn’t done anything except push at her boundaries and make a few threats. She still had no idea who was in charge. But that only made her more wary, because no one this island was what you might call ‘subtle’ and for a group to be so committed to mystery, it made her wonder what their end goal was. Of course, they hadn’t known about the community centre when they started making waves. Maybe that would change things.

Harry ran his finger over the curve of his hook, still watching the king with narrow eyes. “You gonna tell him?”

Uma thought for a moment. Their talk earlier had made her realise that Ben wasn’t totally ignorant of how things around here worked, and he was obviously willing to work with certain risks rather than avoid them all together. But she wanted to wait and see what they were actually dealing with before worrying him. No point in creating fear where there was none. “Nah. Let’s catch the fish before we cook it, okay?”

Harry opened his mouth to say something else, but he was interrupted by a thick stream of paint splashing him across the side. He gaped in horrified anger, turning around to face the culprit.

Gil winced. “Oops. Uh, my bad?”

Harry threw his hat to the ground and shoved his hook at Uma to take. She pressed a hand to her mouth to keep from bursting into laughter at the bright yellow paint running down his jacket, and didn’t bother to stop Harry as he launched himself at Gil. “You baw-faced, degenerate, trot-nosed scunner, I’m gonna gut you like a fish!” he howled.

“Uh, guys?” Ben tried, jumping out of the way as Gil was thrown to the ground, laughing. He looked like he didn’t know whether to be amused or alarmed. “Guys?”

“And you’re next!” Harry said, pointing up at Ben.

Ben met Uma’s eye, shrugging helplessly. She just shook her head. “Work around them,” she advised.


	6. Taking Care

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben and Evie get a day off and Uma gets a present. None of them have any say in this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still haven't read the books! But thanks to fanfic and valuable fandom knowledge, side characters (i.e. Uma's crew) do pop up in name, at least. I hope that's cool with everyone; please let me know if I tread all over your background fave's characterisation without meaning to!

Ben didn’t get a chance to go back to the Isle before the centre was up and running, but he got regular updates, both from the workers, and Uma herself.

“ _Yeah, we’re all good over here, Boss,”_ Dr Sweet told him via video-link. After being hired, he always called Ben ‘boss’ rather than any kind of royal title, and Ben kind of enjoyed it. “ _Got plenty to keep us busy, that’s for sure!”_

There was some kind of commotion behind him, followed by someone barking orders. It sounded a lot like Merryweather.

“Everything okay?” Ben asked.

_“Just a little skirmish outside, nothing unusual.”_

“Do you guys need more guards? We could apply to have more sent over,” Ben offered, glancing at Evie to confirm. She thought for a moment, obviously crunching the numbers of their allotted Isle fund in her head, before nodding. She was perched on the side of his desk, examining two clothing samples. She and Dizzy had been making individualised clothing packs for each of the new students when they arrived, to help them adjust better. It was something Ben never would have thought of doing, even though he knew how important family colours were to people, and he was once again so grateful to have her on board.

“ _Thanks, but we’ve got it covered,”_ Dr Sweet said. “ _Ain’t nobody scarier than this fairy lady you’ve put in charge of us. Besides, the pirate crew have been patrolling the area, warding off trouble makers.”_

Ben smiled. “Sounds like Uma.”

_“Honestly, boss, what we really need is more staff. Medical and mental health. We’re backed up treating immediate injuries, but there’s so many other things that take ongoing work – trauma, malnutrition, long-term illness, and the like.”_

There was an edge to his voice as he recounted all these problems. Ben and Evie glanced at each other, grimacing. “Yeah, I know. I’m on it, believe me. The next Council meeting is tomorrow, I’ll be arguing the case for more staff then.”

“ _You got it, Boss. I know these things take time. We’ve made a good start already.”_

“Thank you. And please, I know you’re flat out, but the reports you send through are our best evidence. If there’s a chance we could get an updated one before we meet next week, it would be really great.”

_“I’ll see what I can do.”_ He sighed. “ _The panther keeps criticising my grammar before I can finish them.”_

“Oh! Dr Sweet,” Evie said, leaning into frame. “Before I forget, the new kids are getting relocated next week. Could we please make the Centre the pick up location? I think that would make the transition a little easier.”

_“That shouldn’t be a problem. Might have to round them up beforehand, though.”_

“I’ll talk to Uma about it, see if she can help,” Ben said.

_“Great, we’ll wait to hear from you.”_ Another loud crash happened off-screen. _“Okay, that’s my cue,”_ he said. “ _Talk soon, Boss. And until next time, Princess.”_

Evie smiled and twiddled her fingers. “Bye!”

Ben sighed as he leaned back. “If the council doesn’t approve more staff … or more funds for that matter …”

“Then I’ll pay for it myself,” Evie said. At his startled look, she tossed her hair. “What? Design pays well. I’ve got plenty of savings to spare.”

“You shouldn’t have to do that, though.”

She shrugged. “Not saying we won’t fight for it all the other ways first – it’s just good to have backup options, right?”

Ben smiled at her. “I’m gonna owe you, like, ten castles.”

She smirked. “Make it one castle with a shopping mall attached, and we’ll call it even!”

He sighed and reached for his laptop. “Well, it sounds like things are pretty much under control over there, for now at least. Now, I’m gonna draft a couple of letters to the state rulers, see if I can influence their representatives’ positions.” He chewed on his lip, thinking it over. “I might need to do a diplomatic visit or two.”

“Ooh, royal visits. Sounds fancy!” She gathered up her materials and hopped off the desk. “I’ll be sure to design Mal a new dress. But in the meantime, Dizzy needs these samples, and I need to finalise the new VK’s schedules. I told Fairy Godmother that they will need specialised classes, but she’s still stuck them in with advanced Math and English. Honestly!”

Before she could take more than two steps, the office door suddenly banged open, making her yelp and drop her fabric. Ben shot to his feet in alarm, but it was only Jay and Carlos. They sauntered inside, both looked rather smug.

“Jay!” Evie said, stamping her foot. “Don’t scare me like that!”

“What are you guys up to?” Ben said suspiciously.

“We,” Jay said, sweeping Evie off her feet, making her squeal. “Are here to kidnap you.”

“Huh?” Ben could only splutter in confusion as Carlos dragged him away from his desk.

“You guys have been at this for weeks. We barely see you, okay? You’re always skipping mealtimes and I know for a fact that you’re not sleeping much, either,” Carlos accused.

“We’ve been busy,” Ben said. “This is important, you get that, right?”

“Yeah, but you need a break. So we are under strict instructions to take you to the Enchanted Lake.”

“Did Mal put you up to this?” Evie demanded, once Jay had put her back down. She was scowling fiercely, but her lips kept twitching in a smile.

“She was the mastermind, but we were the willing enforcers.”

“Okay, okay,” Ben said. “Just let me finish this really quick …”

“No.” Carlos slapped his hand away from the laptop.

“Just one …”

“No!”

“Carlos!” Ben huffed, laughing. The other boy planted himself in front of the desk with a stubborn look on his face. “Seriously!”

“I know what you’re like. One thing will turn into ten, and you’ll still be here by nightfall.”

Ben and Evie exchanged a helpless look. “Well, it looks like we have no choice, Ben,” she said dramatically.

He sighed and raised his hands in defeat. “Okay, I yield. Just let me take the tablet, okay? In case there’s an emergency.”

Carlos grudgingly handed him the mirror-shaped device. “Fine, now let’s go.”

It was a beautiful day outside, Ben could admit that. But every day in Auradon was beautiful, even when it snowed or rained. Today, the sun was shining brightly and the air was warm. The waters of the Enchanted Lake shone temptingly as he, Evie, Jay and Carlos approached. Dizzy Tremaine was in the water already, lying flat on her back as Lonnie helped her float. When she spotted Evie approach, she nearly dropped under the surface in excitement and Lonnie had to hold her up.

“Evie! Look, I’m learning how to swim!”

Evie clasped her hands together and smiled widely. “You’re doing great!”

“Lonnie’s a good swim teacher,” Jay said, stripping his shirt off. “She taught me, too. In no time at all, you’ll be able to do … wait for it …!”

“Don’t you dare,” Lonnie warned.

“This!” He ran to the edge and cannonballed into the water, making Lonnie, Dizzy, and Jane (who was sitting on a nearby rock and had, to this point, avoided the water) shriek. The second he broke the surface, Lonnie splashed him in the face. Carlos rolled his eyes and went to help Jane ring out her hair, while Evie took her shoes off and waded over to help Dizzy out of the water. As for Ben, he made his way over to the gazebo where Mal was, her hair shining like purple fire in the afternoon sun.

“Hey,” he said.

“Well, it’s about time,” Mal said, spinning around to face him and leaning her elbows back on the railing. The effect was ruined when she caught sight of his face, and her smile turned into a worried frown. “You look terrible.”

“Thanks, you look beautiful,” he said, hugging her. She returned the gesture, but quickly leaned back to touch his face.

“Seriously, I leave you alone for three days and you forget how to sleep?” she demanded.

He shrugged, squinting against the sunshine. His eyes did feel a little more sensitive than usual. “Been busy.”

Mal glared at him, and then down at Evie for good measure. “And you! I told you to keep an eye on him!”

Evie shrugged apologetically. “We’ve _both_ been busy.”

Mal scoffed. “I can see that. You’re better at covering your eye bags up, but I can tell you’re not sleeping either.”

Evie gasped in horror. “Eye bags! How dare you!”

“Thanks for ordering the break,” Ben told Mal quietly, bringing her attention back to him.

She shrugged, faking nonchalance. “Well, someone’s gotta look out for you two boneheads.” She fiddled with the edge of his collar, a coy look on her face. “Maybe I need to spirit you away to a tower somewhere. Hoard you like treasure. Let no one else get close.”

Ben’s heart started to thump a little faster. “I think I’d like that.”

“Yeah?” She smiled widely, all teeth and wicked delight.

“Yeah,” he said, and kissed her.

More splashing from the lake made them glance up. Jay and Lonnie were clowning around in the water, trying to dunk each other under. “Don’t you dare drown!” Carlos threatened Jay.

Jay slicked his wet hair back, treading water clumsily to keep himself afloat. Out of all the Isle kids, he’d been the one to dedicate himself to learning how to swim, and was the best at it. “It’s fine, Dude’s got my back,” he said, pointing to the little dog who was paddling along beside him and Lonnie.

“You wanna jump in?” Mal asked Ben.

He leaned his head against hers, watching their friends play and tease each other as if they had no other worries in the world. It felt a bit like a dream. Though, that could have been his fatigue talking. It felt like it had been so long since he’d just hung out or done anything for the pure pleasure of it. Even now, he felt guilty leaving all that work behind, when he knew how important it was. Dizzy was having the time of her life here at the Lake, but there were so many kids like her who didn’t have that opportunity yet. If Ben didn’t keep working, maybe they never would.

“Ben?” Mal prompted.

He forced himself to relax. He owed as much to her as anyone, after all. “Can we just sit for a bit?” he asked. “This is nice.”

“Sure,” she said, looking slightly nonplussed.

“Unless you wanna swim?” he asked, jerking his finger at the raucous splashing. Even Jane had given up on staying dry, and was laughing as she threw sticks in the water for Jay and Dude – whoever got to it first was the winner, apparently. Mal scrunched her nose up. She’d never really taken to swimming.

“Pass," she said drolly. "‘Sides, all the food’s up here.” She reached behind her to grab an apple and took a bite before offering it to him. Ben suddenly realised he was ravenous. He smiled in thanks and accepted it.

They finished the apple together in content silence, watching the others eventually mess around. Evie turned around to catch his eye at one point and gave him an indulgent smile. Something about it looked a little sad to him, but she turned away again before he could get a better look.

“Doug’s not here?” he asked, noticing for the first time.

“He was busy with something. I think he’d avoiding Evie.”

Ben frowned. “They not going so well? Is it because she’d been caught up with all the Isle stuff?”

“I don’t know, she hasn’t wanted to talk about it with me.” Mal took an angry chomp out of the apple. “Whatever. If he’s being an ass, then he doesn’t deserve her anyway.”

Ben liked Doug and he had no idea what was really going on with them, but he had to agree. Evie was working at least as hard as him and sacrificing a lot of her own free time for their shared goals. She needed someone to support her, the way Mal was supporting him (however reluctantly). He had the strange urge to invite Evie over so she could sit with him and Mal. But that would be kind of awkward, right? He’d talk to Evie later, see if she was okay. Right now, in the warm afternoon sun and with Mal pressed up against his side, Ben found that he couldn’t keep a serious thought in his head for longer than a few seconds.

He didn’t even notice himself drifting off to sleep.

_

There were a lot of emails and missed calls waiting for Ben when he stumbled back to his office after the sun had set, but he was pretty much fine with that. Even though he had a crick in his neck from dozing off on Mal’s shoulder and his face was sunburned, and the others had ribbed him to hell and back for both those things, it had been nice to just spend the afternoon relaxing with his friends and girlfriend. He didn’t regret it.

As he went through the long list of messages in his inbox, he came across one from Merryweather, with a couple of reports from the centre staff attached. Ben grinned. That would make the next day’s Council meeting so much easier.

Remembering his promise to Dr Sweet earlier that day, where he’d said he would talk to Uma about getting the new batch of VKs to the centre in time for their limo pickup, Ben took out his mirror tablet and reached out to her. Might as well get onto it sooner rather than later.

Before the picture could properly buffer, he heard Uma’s voice snap, “What?”

“Uh, evening. You at work right now?”

A sigh. “No. What is it?”

“Nothing, just had something I wanted to run by you …” Ben trailed off as Uma’s face finally came into focus, and his stomach dropped to the floor. “What the hell happened?”

Uma gave him a droll look. It was undercut somewhat by the large gash on her forehead, and what looked like an emerging black eye. “Be specific, please.”

“Your face! Are you okay?”

“What, this? It’s nothing, we just had a bit of a brawl.”

Ben’s good mood from the day had evaporated, leaving only frantic guilt in its place. How could he spend the day swimming and napping like that, when Uma and her crew were literally fighting for their lives? “Who were you fighting with? Do you need more guards? I could come over …”

“Oh, gods. Calm yourself, silly king. The last thing we need is more damn guards.” She rubbed the uninjured side of her face with her hand, an unlabelled bottle of clear liquid dangling from her fingers. “Look, there’s some new gang in town. They’ve been making noise around our turf for a while, but this was their first real attempt to do anything about it. Safe to say, they failed. We won the fight, they scurried back to the shadows, we all good.”

“You sure you don’t need backup?”

“We got it covered, Ben,” she snapped.

“Okay, got it. Sorry.” He leaned back in his chair, trying to calm himself down. “You think the gang will quit now?”

“Nah. They’ll give it another crack, but we’ll just beat ‘em even harder than before. Might take a couple of times before they get the message, but when it does sink in, we’ll come out looking even stronger than before.”

“You know who they are?”

Her face fell into a scowl. “Some idiots calling themselves the ‘original alliance’. Bunch of randoms, by the look of it; no one wants to own up to ‘em. We’ll keep looking into it, though.”

Ben nodded, absorbing this. “Is the rest of your crew okay? Harry?”

Uma barked a laugh. “Harry? He’s great. I haven’t seen him this happy in weeks.”

Ben shook his head, smiling. “Fair enough.”

“The rest of them are fine. No more than a little banged up.”

“And what about you?” he asked, peering at the cut on her head. “Maybe you should get that checked out by Doctor Sweet?”

She scoffed. “This is nothing. Had worse from the old hag, and still did double-shifts at the shop afterwards.”

“Old hag?”

“Mommy dearest,” she clarified.

Ben’s heart twisted painfully. He willed his voice to stay calm as he said, “Still, that looks kind of bad. Better to be safe than sorry, right?”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m fine, Ben.”

“But what if it gets infected?”

“That’s what the alcohol is for,” she said, toasting him with the bottle.

Ben tapped his finger on the desk, trying to think of a different approach. “Evie told me that it’s seen as weak on the Isle, to get help when you need it. Is that true?”

She took a drink and shrugged. “Yeah, pretty much.”

“So how can we make sure people will actually go to the doctor if they need it?”

Uma sighed exasperatedly. “People _are_ going. It took a couple of days, sure, but now it looks like the place is a damn hub. You can’t swing a dead fish inside.”

It took Ben a moment to realise what she meant by that. “Uh, right. Hey, that’s great! I’m glad people are going. But what about, like, your crew? Did any of them get seen by a doctor after the fight?”

She paused for a second. “I don’t think so,” she admitted. “But they could if they wanted to, or if I ordered them to. It wouldn’t make them weak.”

“But if _you’re_ not going …” he said slowly.

“I’m the captain,” she snapped. “It’s different for me.”

“Right, you’re their leader. Their, ah, role model. Right?”

She glared at him and didn’t answer.

“I mean,” he continued. “I’m sure they would go if you ordered it. But if they got sick or injured and you didn’t notice right away, do you think they’d take that initiative? Or would they want to be more like their captain and stay strong?”

She slammed the bottle down and muttered something under her breath that he didn’t catch. Finally, she said, “You’re a manipulative ass, you know that?”

“Just a suggestion,” he said, holding his hand up in surrender. “You know best about this stuff, of course. It’s just – and I know it’s not the same thing, but – my friends literally had to force me to sleep and eat today, so, I know how easy it is to forget your own health.”

“Is that why your face looks like a lobster?”

He winced. “Yeah. Sunburn.”

She rolled her eyes. “Whatever. I’m leaving now, go preach to someone else.”

“Okay. Just, uh, keep me updated on the gang situation, okay? I know you’ve got it covered,” he said, before she could interrupt. “But I still need to know as much as possible about what’s going on over there. That puts me in a better place to argue for more resources.”

“Sure, whatever.” She avoided his eyes, looking almost guilty for a split second. Ben wondered just how long this had been going on for. He bit his tongue to avoid asking.

“Thank you. And take care, okay?”

Uma just scoffed and hung up. It was only then that he remembered the question about the new VK relocation, but he figured that could wait until the next day.

(When he did call back the next day, Uma’s cut was neatly taped up and the swelling had gone down. Ben chose not to mention it.)

 _

Uma knew something was up when she walked into the chip shop and her whole crew suddenly went silent. She stopped in her tracks and glared at them all with her arms folded. Almost everyone avoided her gaze, except Harry, who just waited with a smirk on his face.

“Alright, out with it,” she demanded. “What’s going on?”

“Why, whatever do you mean?” Harry, asked, examining his hook as if he’d just given it a manicure.

Uma really wasn’t in the mood for games. Her face was still sore despite Dr Sweet’s ministrations, and she had to work. Besides, it obviously wasn’t anything urgent, or else they wouldn’t be so tight-lipped. “Y’all have five seconds to spill,” she said. “Or everyone’s in time-out for a week.”

Most of them looked willing to hold out for a few more minutes, but the threat of time-out was enough to make Gil crack. “We got you a present!” he burst out.

Everyone groaned and rolled their eyes. Jonas slapped him upside the head.

Uma just stared at them, baffled. “A what?”

“It’s not a bloody present,” Harry grumbled, gesturing at two of them to go out the back. “We wouldn’t insult you so poorly.”

“So what the hell is it then?” she asked, amused in spite of herself.

“Just a nifty little bit of loot,” he said, and made a sweeping motion with his arm. Uma turned to look, and saw Bonnie and Blade emerge from the back room, wheeling something large and purple between them. It took Uma a second to comprehend what she was looking at. Then it clicked; it was a motorbike of some kind, or a scooter.

“Holy shit,” Uma said, wandering over to take a closer look. It was a little banged up, but in decent condition. Hell, it could have been a pile of scrap held together with duct tape, and she would have been impressed. They didn’t really have vehicles on the island, besides what people cobbled together from scratch. This, however, looked Auradon-made. “Where did you get this?”

“Liberated it from Jafar’s scrap shed,” Harry said. “Sources tell me that our little fairy left it behind when last she was here.”

Uma scrunched her nose up. “This is Mal’s?”

“It _was_ Mal’s,” he corrected. “And now it belongs to you.” He draped himself over it like one of Gaston’s girlfriends, gazing up at her playfully. “We was hoping it might cheer you up a wee bit.”

Uma ran her fingers over the handlebars. She didn’t want to look too easily impressed (or worse, touched). “It could use a paint job,” she said.

“I think we can manage that,” he said, grinning.

Uma hid a smile. He always knew how to brighten up her day.


	7. The Nature of Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uma almost catches Feelings. Ben and Evie both have a bad day.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, some of you may have noticed an emerging Ben/Mal/Evie vibe, which is definitely on the cards. But it will definitely be slow burn! I've also updated some of the tags, so please be mindful :)

It took over three weeks before anyone tried robbing the community centre. That, more than anything, reassured Uma that she still had plenty of sway on this island. Of course, by the time anyone got around to _telling_ Uma about the robbery, the culprits were long gone, having been sent on their way quite empty-handed and probably empty-bladdered too, after being pounced on by an angry panther. Seems the guards hadn’t even had to intervene at all.

“You should have kept them here!” she told Merryweather, who was nonchalantly cleaning up the mess that was left behind.

“Now why on earth would we do that?” she asked.

“So I could interrogate them! I’ve been trying to get first-hand intel on the OA for weeks.”

“They weren’t part of any gang,” Merryweather said. “That much was quite obvious. They were just a couple of poor kids trying to raid the medicine cabinet.”

“They know they can get it for free, right?” Grumpy muttered, stomping past with an armful of bandages. “It’s a free service. It’s on the damn sign.”

Uma threw her hands up in frustration. “Fine, well, that’s still not the point! Just ‘cause they were by themselves doesn’t mean we can just tolerate people causing trouble. Or else they won’t be the last.”

Merryweather waved her hand dismissively. “We had it handled, Missie. Don’t you worry your pretty head over it.”

It took everything in Uma’s power not to growl audibly. She’d never had to cooperate with people like this before. Intimidation didn’t work – they just ignored her, or worse, tried to talk about _why_ she felt the need to be intimidating. It wasn’t worth the headache. Instead, she turned to glare at Bagheera. He was sitting up on one of the counters, cleaning his paws. “And what do you have to say for yourself, huh? Did you at least bite one of them?”

He paused and looked up at her. “They weren’t suited to my taste.”

Uma rolled her eyes. For a carnivorous beast, he was awfully … prissy.

Dr Sweet poked his head out. He smiled broadly when he saw Uma. For some reason, she delighted him. Uma didn’t understand it, and she really didn’t like it. “Why don’t you head on back to your ship?” he suggested. “It’s late. We’re all just fine here.”

Uma snarled and stormed out of the centre. Idiots. These people were all _idiots_. The next time she spoke to Ben, she was going to scold him for hiring such incompetent, disrespectful, reckless morons.

It took her a minute to realise she had company. In her defence, large cats like Bagheera blended into the shadows much easier than humans did. “What do you want?” she demanded.

“I’m enjoying the nighttime air,” he said drolly.

Uma snorted. “You enjoy the smell of rotten food and shit?”

“Not particularly. But I appreciate the silence.”

Uma looked around. The docks _were_ quiet, this time of night. A few people loitered about the shops and houses, warming their hands over firepits or watching the street as they smoked, but they didn’t make noise or cause any trouble. It was kind of nice. Still she couldn’t help but be suspicious. “What do you really want?”

He plodded along beside her, steadfast. “I suppose I wanted to make sure you were alright.”

“Why wouldn’t I be alright?”

“Because you take on so much, and there’s only so much any one person can handle.”

“I’m doing my damn job,” she snapped. “The king put your dumbass centre on my territory so I could keep you assholes safe.”

“The king put us here because he knew each of us were capable of looking after ourselves whilst doing our jobs – looking after everyone else,” he pointed out. “I do appreciate the concern, but I have no fear of men.”

Uma glanced sideways at him, and it struck her then, that she was walking alongside a rather large predator. He wasn’t the only one on this island – Shere Khan and Scar were around somewhere – though these days they stuck to the shadows like feral alleycats. “I’d find a way to kill you, if I really wanted,” she said. It wasn’t a threat, despite how it sounded, but a warning. Technically, Shere Khan and Scar didn’t have to rely on Auradonian food waste to survive – they had a whole island full of prey. Too bad for them, the prey learned to fight back pretty quickly. Take Cruella, for instance; most of the sentient animals on this Isle knew to stay away from her, and anyone who’d sell to her. Being a giant cat with sharp claws wasn't a guarantee that one would be safe.

Bagheera, for his part, looked unconcerned. “I suppose you could kill me, but I trust that you wouldn’t try.”

“Well, that’s why you’re an idiot.”

“The king trusts you as well.”

Uma snorted. “Same deal. Idiot with a crown.”

Bagheera sighed. “Allies are important to survival, Uma. You know this better than anyone. You trust your crew, do you not?”

“Yeah, but that’s different. Me and my crew, we’re all on the same level. People like you, and the king? Different level. Can’t trust that.”

He paused, considering this. “I can see that it would be more difficult. I used to believe that birds of a feather should flock together – humans and animals, for instance. But I’ve since learned that appreciating differences and working together leads to better outcomes for all.”

Again, she had to snort. “Like the United States of Auradon, for instance?”

“I was speaking more personally,” he muttered. “But yes. For all their flaws, the states are stronger together.”

“At the Isle’s expense,” she pointed out. “ _Our_ expense.”

He inclined his head. “Which is why you and the king are working together, despite your differences. For better outcomes.”

Uma groaned and rubbed her eyes. It was too early for this shit. “What’s your point, again?”

“My point, daughter of Ursula, is to trust the people who are here to make things better. As we trust you.”

This conversation was veering dangerously close to sappy, and Uma didn't like it. She threw her arms up. “Fine. Fine! Deal with the next break in all by yourselves for all I care. It’s not like I _want_ to be out here in the cold, talking around in circles with a giant cat. There’s a bed waiting for me back in the ship.”

He sat back on his haunches. “You’d better get back to it, then. Goodnight, Uma.”

She just scoffed and left him sitting on the docks. Her night sentry nodded to her as she boarded the ship, reassuring her that nothing had happened while she was gone. She glanced back once, but the panther had already left. She wondered if the whole pointless lecture had been an excuse to walk her home, and got annoyed all over again.

Shaking her head, she made her way back to her cabin. Harry and Gil were right where she left them, curled around each other on the beat-up mattress. Harry would flip out if he knew she’d gone to the centre without him – or any backup for that matter – but she could be stealthy when she wanted. Sighing, she pulled off her boots and jacket and somehow squeezed in between them. Harry immediately wound his arm around her neck and pulled her close.

“Where ye’ been?” he mumbled, his breath smelling like rum. Uma scrunched her nose up and knocked him lightly on the head with her own forehead.

“Don’t worry about it,” she said. “Go back to sleep.”

He squinted one eye open. “Alright?”

“Yeah, fine. I mean it, go the fuck to sleep.”

He mumbled an assent and pushed his face into the crook of her neck. Uma couldn’t sleep herself, so she stared at the ceiling, curling her fingers in his hair, and focussed on the slow rocking motion of her ship in the tide. The panther wanted her to trust. Well, he didn’t know trust like she did with these two. It was hard won, fought for, and deeper than any words could describe. No one else would ever come close.

Villains didn’t love. The closest they could ever manage was trust like this.

_

Ben was having a bad day. It started off with a council meeting, which was dismal enough, and then got worse when Evie didn’t turn up in time to join him. That, in and of itself, didn’t bother Ben; she had school, her design business, and an actual social life, so he didn’t expect her to be present for every meeting. But she usually let him know ahead of time, so it worried him a little that she didn’t say anything. And as selfish as it was, he’d come to rely on her support.

“Why bother hiring more doctors when you rejected twelve applicants last time?”

“Who’s paying for this, exactly?”

“How do you expect to protect the new workers? From what I understand, the ones already stationed are dealing with break-ins and violence.”

Ben answered every question with a smile, but he missed having someone to exchange exasperated glances with.

The outcome was that he managed to approve funding for two more workers – another doctor, and a therapist, just like he’d originally wanted. He would have argued for more, but then came a question that he’d been dreading for a while.

“King Benjamin,” the Arendelle State representative said. “What happens when you run out of room here at the school for children to be relocated?”

“Uh, well, we’ve planned on developing a whole new wing at the school,” he replied. “But the details are still …”

“For up to five hundred children?” Queen Leah said sceptically.

“For as many as needed,” he shot back.

“And what about the ones too young to attend?” the Arendelle representative said again. “Will the other kingdoms be ordered to take children in as well?”

Whispers echoed around the room, suspicious and panicked. Ben tried to ignore them, and the way his fingers shook slightly. He’d planned to bring this up later, once the new batch of kids had settled and proved everyone wrong. But it wasn’t wrong of them to demand answers now. “We may look at fostering, or adoption if it’s appropriate…”

The whispers escalated to a roar. “You would ask people to have these children in their homes?” someone cried incredulously. “Put their families at risk?”

Ben was suddenly very glad that Evie was not here to witness this. He tried to speak again, calm them all down, but it was impossible to be heard over the din. The urge to just yell at them was overwhelming. He curled his hands inside his pocket, breathing deeply, trying not to let his anger get the best of him. Of course, he all knew how little they trusted the VKs. He’d always known it. But to have it spelled out so blatantly made his skin crawl.

_I love them_ , he thought. _I might marry one of them. Our children will be descended from villains. Will you hate them, too?_

Just when he thought he could take it no more, a new voice called out. “Hey.”

It wasn’t a shout, but the sound carried nonetheless. Everyone stopped, their eyes turning to Esmeralda the Romani as she stood up. She didn’t speak again straight away, but drew her shoulders up and glared purposefully around the room. Finally, she said, “I’ll do it.”

Ben didn’t realise she was talking to him at first. In his haste to answer, all he could blurt out was, “What?”

She smiled, sharp and daring. “I’ll foster them. Every child deserves a home. I’ll give one to all of them. We’ll build tunnels underground and a sanctuary beneath this goddamn shining city, if that’s what it takes.” She again looked around the room. “But I don’t think I’ll have to. Despite what you see here, Your Majesty, there are plenty of people in the world who came from nothing. I’m sure many would be happy not to contribute to further suffering.”

The council members glanced away, or hardened their faces in resolution. A scarce few nodded, the dwarves amongst them. “We’re not all cut out for caring for kids,” Esmeralda said. “I get that. But we all need to take some kind of responsibility here. I might be the first to pull my head out of my ass and do that, but I don’t think I’ll be the last. When the time comes, we'll do what we gotta do.” She nodded at Ben, then sat herself back down. “So, can we move on?”

Ben could have leapt out of his chair, bounded across the room, and kissed her. The only reason he didn’t was because his dad was watching, as slack-jawed as almost everyone else in the room. However, King Adam recovered quickly. He cleared his throat and said, “Thank you for that … colourful statement, Mademoiselle Esmeralda.”

“Please,” Ben heard her mutter. “I haven't been a ‘mademoiselle’ for years.”

“Shall we indeed move on?” Adam said loudly, pretending not to hear her.

The meeting finished without further incident, finishing up with a discussion about tax evaders in Sherwood Forest. By the time Ben finally left, he had a pounding headache and some mixed feelings about how things had turned out. They had two new workers for the centre, at least. It was better than nothing. And thanks to Esmeralda, he had real hope for the future of his relocation program. It wasn’t a reality yet.

He just wished that it wasn’t such a steep uphill battle.

But his bad day was far from over. As soon as Ben got back to his office, he received a video call on his tablet from Uma. He allowed himself a moment to breathe deeply before answering. “Hey, what’s up?” he said.

“Yeah, hi, I need a favour,” she said distractedly. She was walking around with the tablet, it seemed. The screen swung wildly, showing him blurred images of her, other people, and what looked like the inside walls of the centre.

“Okay? What do you need?”

“Remind me which kids are leaving in a few days?”

Ben consulted the list that was sitting on his desk. He rattled the names off, but barely got to the end of the list before she was interrupting him again.

“Okay, so we need to change one of ‘em.”

Ben paused, frowning. “Change one? How come?”

 “’Cause Anthony Tremaine’s almost eighteen and not gonna die within the next few weeks, which is more than I can say for the poor bastard who just got brought into the centre,” she said matter-of-factly.

“Why is he going to die?” Ben asked, alarmed. “Wait, who is he?”

“Carlisle, he’s Clayton’s … youngest kid, I think? I dunno, there’s too damn many of them. Anyway, he ran off on his dad and straight into the middle of a gang conflict across town,” she said. “So now, like, ten different people want to kill him. He’s eleven, by the way.”

“Um…”

“And it’s his own damn fault for being so stupid, I get that. But the fairy won’t kick him out of the centre, and so long as he’s here, the whole place is a target. Clayton’s a nasty, stubborn prick, he ain’t gonna give up. So getting him off the island is the only thing that’s gonna fix this.”

“Wow, okay. That’s a lot.” Ben rubbed his face, trying to think. “I hear you, Uma,” he said eventually. “But we can’t just change which children we bring over at the last minute. There’s a whole process, and a selection system, and …”

“Oh, you mean Princess Evie’s list?” Uma demanded. “The kids like her, who’re gonna smile and play nice and go to school? That’s bullshit. They’re not the ones who need it most.”

“I’m not disagreeing, but we need to plan it properly,” Ben tried to say.

Uma growled and swung the mirror around so he had a full view of Dr Sweet’s office. He caught a bare glimpse of a boy sitting on the bed, clutching his arm while blood ran down his face. His shirt had been removed, probably for treatment, and Ben could see bruises littered all over his thin torso. Then the scene flipped back to Uma’s angry face. “You wanna tell him that?” she said in a low voice.

All of Ben’s protests died on his tongue. “Just … leave it with me, okay?” he said weakly. “I’ll think of something.”

Someone called her name off-screen and she glanced away. “Fine. I gotta go.”

The screen switched off. Ben let the tablet drop back on the table and covered his face with both hands, feeling hollow and anxious. He had no idea how he was going to convince the Council to either switch one of the kids or take an extra one. But he didn’t doubt that this was serious; Uma had a very high threshold for emergencies, and if she was worried, then there must be a good reason. Maybe they could sneak him in the trunk. He certainly  _looked_ small enough.

When someone knocked on the door, he had half a mind to pretend he wasn’t there. He needed time to think. But then Evie’s voice called out, thin and hesitant. “Ben? Are you in?”

His head snapped up. “Come in.”

She entered, her head bowed and shielded by her hair. “I’m so, _so_ sorry I missed the meeting,” she said, busying herself with closing the door.

“It’s okay, it’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” He was about to tell her about the unfortunate call with Uma, but something about her demeanour made him stop. He ducked his head to try and see her face properly. “Are … are you alright?”

She barely glanced up, but it was enough to see the tear tracks on her face. In an instant, Ben was out of his seat and hurried around to the front of his desk, one hand outstretched. “Hey, what’s the matter?”

“Nothing,” she squeaked. “I mean, nothing important. Doug, he … well, we broke up.” She tossed her hair back, almost defiantly, letting him see her red eyes and raw nose.

“Oh, Evie. I’m so sorry.”

She sniffed harshly. “It’s fine.”

Cautiously, he placed a hand on her shoulder. “You wanna talk about it?”

She looked conflicted, her lip quivering.

“Or I could call the guys up here,” he said, reaching for his phone. “Just give me one sec, I’ll text Mal.”

“No!” she yelped, and smacked the phone clean out of his hands. They both watched it bounce across the floor in shock for a long, awkward moment. Then she buried her head in her hands and started sobbing. “I’m sorry!”

“It’s fine,” he said faintly.

“Don’t tell them, okay? Not yet. They’ll want to kill him, and I just can’t deal with that right now!”

Ben opened his mouth to disagree, but then thought better of it. She had a point. “Okay, whatever you need.” With a lack of anything else he could think of to help, he hesitantly wrapped an arm around her shoulders. She fell easily against his side, shuddering, and his chest clenched. He rarely saw her like this; she was more inclined to show when she was upset than the others (Mal got frosty, Jay got angry, and Carlos just shut down), but it was always restrained, her lips tight and her head held high in spite of her inner torment. Grown-up. Like him. This – breaking down over a boy – was such a normal teenage thing to do that it disconcerted him.

“I knew it was coming,” she said, all in a rush. “I mean, I knew we might not be boyfriend and girlfriend for much longer. We weren’t able to spend any time together lately, especially now Dizzy’s been helping so much with the business, and I almost … thought that was okay? You know? But then he broke up with me and I just … I just …” A fresh wave of sobs overtook her. “I just feel like such a failure!”

“Evie, no,” Ben said. You’re not …”

She abruptly tore herself away and started pacing back and forth, wringing her hands. “I just keep thinking, if I was smarter or prettier or nicer, then I would have been able to do it! I could have been the perfect girlfriend! But I wasn’t, I wasn’t enough of _any_ of those things, so now he doesn’t love me anymore and if he can’t love me then _no one_ will ever love me!”

Ben gaped at her, barely able to follow her spiralling logic.

“Mommy was right,” she breathed, her face suddenly going slack and distant. “She was right all along.”

He lurched forward. He didn’t know what her mom had told her, but if it was causing this kind of panic, then it was probably very wrong. “Woah, hey. No. Your mom wasn’t right about anything.”

Evie didn’t seem to hear him. “I mean, ever since I was little, she said that I could make anyone love me, but I had to work for it. Always work, always be aware. Can’t get lazy or slip up. Or they’ll see all the ugly bits underneath and they won’t love you anymore, they’ll just leave.” She whirled on him. “Every day, Ben! My whole life, she said that! And I still forgot, how could I forget, how could I slip up like this?!”

Ben held her shoulders firmly, trying to ground her. He’d been wrong before; this wasn’t a normal teenage thing. This was Carlos hiding in a tree, and Jay lashing out on the tourney field, and Mal running away back to the Isle. It was pain buried somewhere deep, and for whatever reason, the break-up had forced it to the surface. “Hey, listen, listen,” he said, trying to sound soothing. “You’ve done nothing wrong. You’re not lazy, you haven’t slipped up, and you’re _not_ ugly, not anywhere.”

“But he left … he …” she swallowed heavily. “He stopped loving me.”

“ _We_ still love you,” he said. “Mal, Jay and Carlos do. And so does Dizzy. And so do I. That doesn’t change, Evie, no matter how imperfect you feel. I’m sorry Doug wasn’t the one to tell you that, but it’s true. Okay?”

He was babbling and he knew it, the words coming out all desperate and jumbled. She looked at him like he was speaking in tongues for a long moment. Then suddenly, she fell forward and burying her face in his chest. Ben forced himself to shut up, instead just wrapping his arms around her and holding on tight. They stayed like that for a few, long minutes, swaying back and forward slightly.

He thought again of that kid back on the Isle, hunted by his own father. Maybe Uma was right, and he was in more danger than any of them. But as Ben had come to realise, and what Evie was reminding him of right now, was that none of these kids were safe, not really. They were all hurt somehow, and the scars stayed with them.

Ben couldn’t save them all at once. He knew that. Sometimes, like right at this moment, taking care of the ones he had was the best thing he could do.


	8. Sabotage

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the shit hits the fan, plot-wise.

As it turned out, rounding kids up for relocation hadn’t really been necessary. Most of the kids got to the centre by themselves just fine, and two of them were dropped off by their parents. Carlisle, of course, was already there. Only one family put up a real fight, the mom (a lady of the Queen of Hearts’ court) holding tight to her daughter inside the home while the dad (one of Hook’s crew) stood outside, spitting and snarling at the guards. It was almost admirable, this show of parental protectiveness. Many parents on the Isle _did_ love their children in one way or another – but Uma had heard too many violent arguments coming from this house and the girl had shown up at the centre with too many cuts and bruises for Uma to be swayed.

In any case, Uma didn’t have to intervene. The guards handled it easy enough, escorting the girl outside within minutes. The girl’s face was blank, as if she’d checked out of the situation entirely. It wasn’t until she was standing out front of the centre while the limos pulled up that the reality seemed to sink in, and a desperate, terrified hope filled her eyes.

People loitered around, staring at the kids with a mix of resentment, longing, suspicion and scorn. Uma watched from a distance along with the other spectators, leaning against a shop wall with her arms folded. She didn’t blame them. Once upon a time, she’d wanted nothing more than to go to Auradon. Sue her, she’d wanted her fucking fairytale. Then, after her invite never came, her heartbreak had turned to anger.

Uma was still angry. Nothing would ever change that. In fact, some days she thought it might be the only thing keeping her on her feet.

But a least these days, it had some kind of purpose. Take today, for instance. Here she was, watching seven kids go from hell to paradise, and yeah, she was still kind of jealous. But one of those kids wouldn’t be going without her. Little Carlisle Clayton, still with bruises across his face, he was going to Auradon because she, Uma, made it happen.

(Well, she’d insisted to the king that it had to happen, and he’d somehow followed through on that purely because he’d trusted her to make that call. That was gratifying in a different kind of way.)

She watched the kids get into the first limo, one by one. None of them were as infamous as the original four idiots who went. Carlisle and Anthony were the only ones whose surnames were likely to cause a stir. That made sense, as Princess Evie had been in charge of picking them – she’d choose the quiet ones, whose parents were less likely to incite some kind of hostile takeover. Looking back, Uma’s still not sure whether it was sheer stupidity that made Ben choose Mal and her gang (making him the luckiest bastard alive when it happened to pay off) or actual cunning. She hoped to find out one day.

Uma peeled herself off the wall as the last kid got in, swallowing down that persistent pang of jealousy. She had better things to do, anyway. But before she could turn away, her eyes hooked on the last kid’s face, ducked down low just before he disappeared into the limo. She felt a strong jolt of recognition, and it wasn’t for the right reasons.

That face … the hateful eyes … the clang of swords in her mom’s chip shop …

_“I am Li Fang. My father was Li Wei, also known as Bleda, of the great Hun army …”_

_Fang glared at her. “We are the future of the Isle.”_

Uma’s blood froze in her veins, and for one second, all she could do was stare as the limos drove off – the first one full of children, the second making up their security detail. It was only after they’d rounded the corner and disappeared that she stumbled into action. “Harry!” she shouted, starling everyone in her immediate vicinity. “Gil! To me, to me!”

Harry wasn’t far away. He ran up to her, breathing heavily. “What is it, Captain?”

“Follow that limo! Don’t let it leave the Isle!”

“What?!” Normally he didn’t question her, but she’d given specific instructions not to interfere with the relocation not a half-hour ago. “Why?”

She was already sprinting back to her mom’s shop, shoving bystanders out of the way. “We got a stowaway!”

_

Carlisle slouched down in his seat, scowling out the window at all the people gawking. Scowling, he’d found, was a good way to make others think that he wasn’t helpless, or someone to be messed with. It had never worked so well with his dad, but seemed just fine on the other kids in the car. They chatted amongst themselves, slowly getting louder in excitement, and pretty much ignored him except for the odd, anxious glance sent his way. Idiots.

Only the Tremaine guy seemed unphased, either by Carlisle or the fact that they were leaving the Isle to an unknown fate. He did have one tell, though – he tapped his leg repeatedly with his dye-stained fingers. Carlisle only caught it because he was good at seeking out tiny changes in mood. His dad had taught him that.

Thinking of his dad made him angry all over again. He’d left his old man to be _free_ , and he would have been _fine_ , except one tiny mistake had gotten his ass beat, and then he’d been trapped all over again in that stupid centre. They hadn’t let him leave. As soon as his arm was fixed and the shock had faded, Carlisle had tried everything – sneaking around, kicking the walls, and screaming every kind of abuse in the workers’ faces. He’d even attacked that big doctor, though admittedly, that was mostly because his sheer size reminded Carlisle of his dad at a weak moment. It hadn’t done much; the doctor had just sighed and let himself get punched in the chest for a solid minute, until finally walking away.

They’d put him on panther watch, after that.

“My dad’ll skin you,” he’d threatened, fuming after being dropped back on his bed by the beast like a tiny child.

The large cat merely blinked at him impassively. “He can certainly try.”

Even if he had managed to escape, Carlisle had known that he wouldn’t get very far. For some reason, the daughter of Ursula had been determined for him to go to Auradon. Carlisle didn’t get it. He’d promised to stay away from her territory and bring no further trouble, but she hadn’t seemed to believe him.

Anyway, he was here now, heading off to a strange new place where he didn’t know the rules, the people, or how to get the things he needed. Good thing Carlisle was a survivor. He’d find a way.

He was so wrapped up in his worries and frustration that he barely noticed when the car slowed to a halt. They were still on the Isle. He could smell it. So why the delay? From behind the screen divider between front and back seat, he heard the driver talking to his passenger – the last kid, who hadn’t fit in the back with the rest of them. Carlisle frowned and leaned forward slightly, trying to hear.

There was a sudden, vicious choking noise, and something splattered against the screen divider. Each of them jumped in alarm. Carlisle’s heart started hammering. He knew the sound of a shank when he heard it.

With one shaking hand, he reached over and pressed the button that lowered the screen.

“Don’t!” Tremaine hissed, but he stared in horrified anticipation along with the rest of them as the front of the car slowly became visible. Carlisle got a brief glimpse only; the driver spasming in his seat, blood spilling across his blue and gold uniform, and the kid leaning over him with his knife still poised. He glanced back at them, and Carlisle froze.

“Shut up and don’t interfere,” their stowaway hissed.

Before any of them could react, the front passenger door was wrenched open, the guard’s body was unceremoniously dumped outside. Another person hopped not the car. Carlisle didn’t recognise him, but they looked like one of the old folks – he was dressed in pirate gear, and his face was lined and leathery. The pirate immediately turned on them with a knife in each hand, giving them a nasty, yellow smile.

“Now you wee lads just sit sight, now,” he said.

One of the girls in the back squeaked in horror, looking back out the rear window. Carlisle glanced back at well, and found that the limo behind them was being swarmed with people from the Isle. The guards fought back, but they were taken by surprise and outnumbered. Their assailants made quick work of them, their smaller, quicker blades cutting easily through the spears. In what felt like seconds, they’d left most of the guards bleeding on the ground, and climbed into the car – Carlisle counted at least half a dozen, if not more. Carlisle saw one of the guards push himself up to his elbows, his chest heaving, and wondered how many of them were left alive. But before he could see anything further, their own car jolted back into gear.

“Alrighty, then!” the pirate said, grinning madly. “Let’s go to Auradon!”

The boy pressed his foot to the accelerator, and the car sped off. Carlisle gripped the door handle to keep himself steady as they swerved frantically through the tiny streets, people forced to dodge out of their way to avoid getting hit. Several trash cans and one poor lady’s jewellery stall weren’t so lucky. As the edge of the Isle drew closer, he fumbled to get the door open, hoping to roll out before they left, but it was still firmly locked. “Let us out!” he demanded, ignoring Tremaine’s warning glare. The eldest boy was trying to shield the others with his body, but Carlisle didn’t need anyone to protect him. “Why do you need to bring us?”

The kid in the drivers’ seat scoffed. “And get killed as soon as we get there? No thanks. You’re our ticket inside.”

“It won’t work,” one of the other kids snapped. “They’ll just think we’re as bad as you.”

He just shrugged dispassionately. “We’ll see.”

Great. Before, Carlisle had been uncertain about what would happen once they got to Auradon. Now, he was certain they were going to die. He again tried desperately to open the door, and when that still didn’t work, resorted to thumping on the glass with his fist. Deep down, however, he knew it was hopeless.

Amidst the panic, Carlisle became aware of a new sound. It started off as a distant hum, but increased to a dull roar the closer they got to the edge. He peered out the window, but could see nothing amongst the blur of buildings and crowds of peoples. Suddenly, a teal-green bike zoomed by, overtaking both of the limos and swerved to a halt right in front of them. Their abductor slammed the breaks automatically, making them all jerk forward.

The girl on the bike stared them down, revving the engine a couple of times. The sound bounced over the clustered buildings, echoing through the alleyways. She then removed the helmet and shook her braids out. “Yo!” she called out. “Where d’you think you’re going, Fang?”

The driver – Fang, apparently – scowled and tightened his hands around the wheel.

“Just drive,” the pirate snapped. “Run the bitch over!”

Carlisle’s heart sped up. He didn’t want to find out what would happen if two vehicles collided point blank. Maybe they’d explode, like in the movies. He glanced back at the limo behind them, trying impatiently to inch forward. There wasn’t enough room in the alley for it to overtake. After a moment, some of its occupants cautiously let themselves out of the vehicle and started to advance. The pirate swore and stumbled out. The kid who’d killed the driver stayed behind the wheel. “Alright then, have it your way, you stupid girl!”

Uma swung her leg off the bike and drew both her swords. Despite the abysmal odds, she looked oddly triumphant. Carlisle supposed that stopping them had been her main goal. But how long could she hope to hold them off?

The pirate was the first to charge. He swung his cutlass at her with a yell, and their blades met with a sharp _clang_. She parried the blow with one sword and used the other to swipe at his side. He howled in pain and crumpled to his knees, where she sent him sprawling with a kick to the face. Uma swung around to face the rest of them, panting slightly, a determined glint in her eyes.

It was still hopeless, Carlisle thought. As good as Uma was, twelve-to-one just wasn’t possible. Eventually, she’d go down … but there was no telling how long it would take. Maybe if she stalled long enough, Auradon would send out reinforcements, or the workers from the centre would come to help.

It seemed like Fang was thinking the same thing. His face fell into a resolute frown, and he gripped the wheel a little tighter, his fingers trembling. Carlisle realised what he was going to do a split second before it happened, reading it in the tension on his shoulders and the slant of his body. Before his foot could press down on the accelerator, Carlisle lunged forward and wrapped his skinny arms around the boy’s neck, pulling him backwards. Fang choked and swung wildly with his knife, but couldn’t quite land a hit.

Tremaine swore and darted forward, managing to take hold of Fang’s arm. However, he wasn’t so lucky as Carlisle, and got slashed for his trouble. He grunted in pain and fell back, leaving Carlisle to hold on for dear life.

Cracking on eye open, Carlisle saw the other stowaways stalk past their car, advancing upon Uma as one. They’d planned this out, Carlisle could tell. They weren’t going to let one girl stop them from succeeding. She raised her swords and backed up a step, her eyes darting from one to the other, defiant to the last moment.

A sudden cry of war echoed through the streets. Pirates emerged from the alleys and jumped down from the rooftops, surrounding the limos and facing off against the escapees. A flash of red darted past the car – Harry Hook leading the charge, standing alongside Uma with wild fury in his eyes. She grinned at him, triumph eclipsing her relief. Together, they jumped into action against the stowaways, their blades swinging, and her entire crew followed suit.

Fang went slack with surprise as he saw the surrounding forces, and this time, Anthony Tremaine was able to take the knife from him. He pulled Carlisle out of the way and pressed the blade to Fang’s neck. “Let us out,” he growled.

One of the stowaways was thrown bodily against the car, making it shake. Tremaine squinted at the fighting going on around them. “On second thoughts,” he said. “We might just wait this out.”

It didn’t take long. Fang’s group were brutally efficient, but this time it was Uma’s crew who had the element of surprise. They fought until the stowaways went scurrying back to the shadows, limping from their wounds. Carlisle watched the colour drain from Fang’s face as he realised that he was the last one left. With the knife still pressed to his neck, he had no opportunity to flee with the rest of them, and could only watch helplessly as Uma stomped over to the car and pulled the door open.

“Well, lookee here,” she drawled, standing over him with Harry at her back. “The future of the Isle.”

He bared his teeth in helpless fury. “They’ll be back,” he threatened.

“’Course they will. Harry. Gil.”

Her two crew members hauled Fang out of his seat and held him between them. He struggled, but one punch to the stomach from Gil had him sagging.

“Get him back to the ship,” she instructed curtly. She then glanced at the kids still trapped in the car. “You all good back there?”

Tremaine answered for all of them. “We’re alive.”

“Good, so let’s get this show back on the road.”

To Carlisle’s surprise, one of the guards limped into view. He looked a little banged up, with a nasty wound on his shoulder, but plainly still alive as well. He and Uma exchanged a nod.

“You sure you can still make it?” he heard her ask quietly.

“Without a doubt,” he assured her. There was a moment’s hesitation before he said, “We’ll send for the injured as soon as possible. And the bodies.”

“I’ll make sure they’re looked after until then,” she promised. “I … I’m sorry.”

The guard smiled sadly. “Don’t be. We all knew the cost of coming here. Thank you for helping us fulfil our duty.” With a slight grunt, he lowered himself into the passenger seat, still damp with his fellow’s blood. To the kids in the back, he said. “Don’t worry. We’re still getting you out of here.”

“Wait!” Carlisle burst out, leaning forward to address Uma. She looked at him, frowning in surprise. He swallowed and gave voice to the thought that had been lingering in his mind all week. “What if … what if I don’t belong there?”

She shrugged. “It don’t matter if you ‘belong’ there or not, kid. You still fought to get there anyway. Like when you grabbed that scumbag from behind.”

“You saw?”

“Yeah. You did what you had to do, what we all do. We fight to survive, not ‘cause we deserve it, but ‘cause we all want to be safe. That place is safe, so, you’re going. That’s just how it’s gonna be.”

Carlisle felt himself flush. “I just grabbed him ‘cause he was gonna run you over.”

She gave him a tiny smirk. “Well, maybe you belong there after all. Now shut up and sit back down.”

She closed the door and thumped the hood twice. The guard nodded at her and kicked the car back into gear. Just like that, they were off again. Carlisle pressed his face to the rear window and kept his eyes on the Isle as they left. He didn’t stop watching, even as the car leapt off the land and over the ocean onto a magic bridge.

As he left behind everything he knew, Carlisle thought about Uma’s words. _We fight to survive_. He wondered what it meant, when people like her fought for others to survive instead. He wondered if that was what heroes did. Maybe in Auradon, he’d learn how to be a hero too.


	9. Hope (and Hopelessness)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uma has a bad day. Consequences occur on both sides of the barrier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Uhh this chapter is longer than normal and kind of angsty. But, like one lovely commenter said a few chapters back, this is a story of people trying to take care of each other and do the right thing regardless of terrible circumstances, so it's not all bad.

Mal hadn’t been kidding when she’d said she wanted to hoard Ben and Evie away like a pile of treasure. She couldn’t help it – it was in her nature to be possessive. For so long, possession had been her only substitute for love, and even now, she sometimes thought that it was the best she was capable of.

Case in point: When Evie had told her about her break up with Doug, it had been the best news Mal had received in weeks. She hadn’t been proud of it (and it didn’t make her want to kill Doug any less), but at least that was _one_ less thing taking up her best friend’s time and attention.

Besides, the break up had probably done Evie good. Once she stopped crying, she threw herself back into her work with an extra bounce in her step and a determined glint in her eye.

“It’s all part of it, isn’t it?” she told Mal. “Having a boyfriend, losing a boyfriend, realising what’s really important. We get to do all that now! And soon the new kids will, too!”

Mal just smiled awkwardly. She found the drama of teenage relationships exhausting rather than exciting. She missed the days when she could just have her own little circle of people, and they just stayed put and didn’t wander off, and none of them talked about their feelings, ever. “Yay for them.”

Even without Doug, Evie was still run off her feet in the days leading up to the new VK’s arrival, and Mal was helplessly swept up in the chaos. All went according to plan, right up until the very last moment, at which point it all went to hell.

She still wasn’t entirely sure what happened. One minute, Evie was pacing back and forth across her mirror, her eyes alight with nerves, excitement, and so much hope that she looked like she might burst with it. Then Carlos had burst into their room and said that there had been a complication with the new VK’s arrival. That they were early, and the car was full of blood. Mal and Evie exchanged a horrified glance, and they’d sprinted down to the front of the school to see what was going on.

There was no marching band this time, nor greeting committee of students. There was only a small gaggle of caretakes, headed by Fairy Godmother, who had been tasked with settling the new kids into the school. But what should have been a happy affair had descended into chaos. The kids were dishevelled and frantic, their eyes darting wildly around as if looking for an escape. One of them was crying. Out of the half-dozen guards who’d been sent to collect the children, Mal could only see one – he was leaning exhaustedly against the limo, clutching at an injury around his stomach.

Evie allowed herself one moment to take in the scene, clutching Mal’s hand briefly for support, before tightening her shoulders and hurrying over to help. Ben was already there, talking to them in his low, soothing voice. Mal and Carlos hung back uncertainly. Mal didn’t want to crowd them; already, she could see curious and wary faces peeking out the windows and starting to gather in the school entrances. She turned her glare on them, hoping that would be enough to keep the other students away.

“What happened?” she said to Carlos.

He shrugged tightly. “They were attacked before leaving the Isle.”

“Attacked? By who?” Uma’s face sprang to her mind, unbidden.

“They don’t know yet. One of the kids who was supposed to come got replaced by an intruder. They …” Carlos swallowed. “They killed the driver and took over the car.”

“To get into Auradon,” she said, with dawning horror.

“Looks like.”

Mal felt her hands curl into fists. “I knew this would happen,” she growled. “I told them, she couldn’t be trusted, she was planning this from the start …”

Carlos grabbed her arm. “Cut that out! You’re scaring them!”

Mal glanced over at the group. Sure enough, a few of the kids were staring at her in frozen terror, just like they used to do back on the Isle. Mal huffed in frustration and blinked the green out of her eyes. “You know I’m right,” she told Carlos.

“We don’t know anything right now,” he said. “Let’s wait to hear the full story first, okay?”

Mal fumed silently, feeling helpless. All she could do was watch and wait as more people arrived on the scene – doctors, guards, and school staff. She saw Ben take a step back and pull out his mirror tablet, turning away to, presumably, try and contact Uma. Mal grit her teeth and jerked her gaze away, not wanting to see the other girl’s face on the screen. After a few more minutes, the school staff started to herd the children away with Evie’s gentle encouragement. However, one of the kids looked completely overwhelmed by what was happening. She started to back away, looking like a scared rabbit. One of the teachers reached out to her and that was the last straw – she bolted.

The girl was quick and lithe, dodging all the hands that flung out in an attempt to catch her. But Carlos was quicker. Before Mal could react, he left her side and sprinted after the girl, managing to catch up with her before she was out of sight. He crouched down beside her, holding her gently by the shoulders as she shrieked and raged. He barely flinched, even as her fists cam dangerously close to his face as she mindlessly tried to escape. He continued to hold her and speak quietly. Within minutes, she had calmed down. Carlos stood and guided her back to the group, one arm wrapped around her shoulders. He nodded at Ben and smiled at Evie, the latter’s eyes damp with relief and pride.

Mal had to swallow the lump in her own throat, watching as Carlos, Evie and the Isle children slowly made their way back to the school. How far they’d come, she thought. And how little she had changed.

She felt, rather than saw, Ben stand beside her. Their hands found each other without either of them looking, both focused on the children.

“It wasn’t Uma,” he said without preamble. “It was some other gang. Uma stopped them, got the kids off the Isle.”

Mal’s fingers tightened around his, hard enough to make him wince. “They told you that?”

“Yeah.”

“What did _she_ have to say about it?” Mal knew he and Uma spoke to each other regularly. Ben went out of his way not to do it when they were together and Mal was more than fine with that. But right now they had a major Uma-related crisis on their hands and Ben was still openly clutching the tablet, so pretending otherwise was kind of pointless.

He glanced at her, slightly hesitant. “She’s not answering,” he said. “Carlisle said it was a major brawl, though, so she’s probably dealing with the fallout, same as us.”

Ben clenched the tablet a little tighter, his gaze miles away. Mal swallowed down her bitterness. She’s always known that she’d have to share Ben with the world. She was happy to share him with her friends. She _accepted_ (grudgingly) that she had to share him with Uma as well – his time and attention, if not his love. But It was more than that – for some reason, he trusted Uma, respected her, and clearly liked her in some way. Right now, he was worried about her. Mal was caught between wanting to comfort him and scream at him.

“I’ll talk to her later, when things have calmed down,” he said, dismissing the topic entirely. He glanced back at the school, taking in all the wary, gawking faces as the students tried to figure out what was going on. Rumours would be flying around in no time, and even Mal felt a pang of empathy for the new kids, having to navigate all that nonsense. Ben sighed. “Well, this didn’t turn out the way I’d hoped.”

Mal shrugged. “They’re here,” she said simply. “Mission still accomplished.”

He managed a tiny smile, and she returned it. Suddenly, his phone beeped. Ben glanced at it, and his face fell. “Emergency Council meeting,” he said.

Mal’s heart sank. That couldn’t mean anything good. “Because of this?”

“Yeah, they’ll be panicking. I have to be there and make sure they don’t do anything rash.”

“Like what? Send them back?”

Ben’s face flashed panic for a second. “No. No, they can’t do that,” he said firmly, though it looked like he was trying to convince himself. “But they might … I don’t know. I just, I have to go.”

Mal grabbed his jacket to hold him in place. “Hey,” she said. “It’s gonna be okay.”

Ben smiled tightly. “Thanks, Mal. Will you check on Evie and the others? Make sure they settle in okay? I wanted to be there, but …”

Mal could have told him that she was a pretty poor substitute for Ben as far as welcoming committees went, with his dumb, reassuring, impossible _kind_ face. The kind of face that made you think, actually, there was a sliver of genuine hope to be found here in Auradon. Mal had tried to be that. She’d failed, utterly and miserably. But Ben couldn’t be everything to everyone, no matter how hard he tried, and no matter how thin he spread himself in the meantime.

 _Let me hoard you away_ , she wanted to beg. _None of this is your fault. Let’s leave it all behind._

But Ben would never do that, and she could never force him. No matter how tempting the idea was, now and again. They would simply have to deal with this shitshow, together.

Mal scrounged up her best, most genuine smile and patted him on the chest. “I’m on it. You go do what you have to do.”

He kissed her quickly, gratefully, and then he was off, slipping out of her grasp once more.

_

Uma had never seen someone be brought back from the brink of death before. She’d heard stories about it, of course – usually involving magic, and true love’s kiss, and other such garbage. The reality was much messier. Uma had intended to just poke her head into the centre and make sure her injured crew members were staying put until they got seen by the staff, but she found herself caught up in the chaos.

The centre was packed with people – staff, crew members, guards, random people from the Isle – each of them rushing about frantically. Merryweather stood in the centre, directing everyone with a firm, sharp voice. The injured guards were in Sweet’s room, and that was where Uma found herself, her heart racing as she watched the doctor try to hold a man’s organs together with his hands. A couple of nurses orbited around him with tools and needles and equipment that Uma didn’t entirely recognise. The man on the table gasped and gurgled, his blood spilling over Sweet’s hands. There was blood _everywhere_ , actually, and none of it was where it was supposed to be.

Uma had no problem with blood. She’d seen enough of it in her lifetime, and even spilled some of it herself. Her stomach had no business filling up with fluttery moths over this, and yet, she couldn’t seem to look away.

“Where’s the sedative?” Sweet said, his voice booming. “We need … ah, crap.”

The man on the next bed’s heartrate started speeding up. One of the nurses – Uma though she might have been a fairy, though she had no magic here, more’s the pity – rushed over to help him.

Uma didn’t even know what she was doing here. Well, that wasn’t true; Grumpy had shoved a box of bandages in her hands and shoved her towards Sweet, and she’d been too startled to refuse. But she didn’t know why she was _still_ here. There was a crew waiting for her direction, a prisoner to torture for information, and at some point, the king would want an update.

The mirror on her belt buzzed with an incoming call. She ignored it.

“Uma!” Sweet said, catching sight of her standing nearby. Uma tensed, ready to be told to get out, but instead he jerked his head, beckoning her over. “Can you take over here for a minute? I need my hands free.”

Uma grimaced. “I can’t. I mean, I don’t know how.”

“You got two hands, right? That’s all I need right now.”

Yeah, Uma had two hands. Both equally capable, dominant and dexterous. It made her good at fighting, and even killing. For saving lives and holding people together? Not so much.

But Uma was still functioning on some weird kind of autopilot (was this what it was like, having adults around that you actually trusted? You just up and did what they said?) so she found herself washing her hands and donning a pair of gloves before standing beside Sweet, letting him guide her to the right position.

“Okay, good job,” he said. “Now just hold tight, I’ll be right back.”

She felt a brief flare of panic as he left, but stamped it down and concentrated on keeping her hands still. They _were_ good hands. They didn’t shake or fidget, even though the last time she’d done this for a crew member, he’d ended up bleeding out on her deck. She’d never imagined trying to do it for an Auradon guard, of all people. But looking into his stark white face and rolling, bloodshot eyes, Uma couldn’t really see the difference between him and her long-dead crew member.

The bleeding seemed to be slowing down. She hoped that was a good sign. But judging by the nurse’s stony expression as she worked around Uma, it probably wasn’t.

“Hey,” she heard herself say in a low voice. “You’re not dying on this shithole, okay? You got a nice home and a fancy job and, I don’t know, some disgustingly cute family waiting back home, I bet. They’d be super pissed if you went and died here, on this dumbass island.”

The nurse glanced at her, but didn’t pay her any attention. The guy probably couldn’t hear a damn thing she was saying, but Uma liked to think maybe she could bully him out of dying nonetheless.

“You’ve got to live,” she said, her voice even quieter. “Or they won’t send anymore of you, and then we’ll _all_ die here.”

Her tablet buzzed again. Uma tightened her grip on the man’s stomach.

Sweet returned and injected the guard with something that made his face go slack and his shaking cease. He then took over Uma’s position once again, patching up the wound in his stomach with quick, deft movements.

“Thanks,” he told her. “You done good.”

She stared at the man. “He gonna be okay?”

“We’ll know soon enough.” He glanced at her, his eyes crinkling in the corners. “Hey, why don’t you head on out? You’ve already saved the day once, you don’t need to be here.”

Part of Uma wanted to argue, both out of sheer habit, and because the longer she immersed herself in chaos, the longer she could put off facing the music. But she couldn’t do that forever. Uma nodded at Sweet once, then quietly let herself out of the centre.

Outside, it was almost as busy. People loitered around the entrance and further back, watching with hawklike eyes. They reminded Uma of the vultures that often circled over the island, waiting for the prey to die. She scowled at some of them until they slunk away, but a few of them stayed and stared back impassively.

Uma felt unease prickly at the base of her spin. She had a good crew, but half of them were injured and they couldn’t be in all places at once. If anyone decided to attack the centre while there were vulnerable Auradon guards inside, Uma had to admit that they’d have a good shot.

 _Auradon will come get the guards,_ Uma thought to herself. _They ain’t gonna just leave them here._

The tablet buzzed. Her hand twitched towards it, but she curled it into a fist and did not answer. Gritting her teeth, Uma made her way back to the ship.

The ship looked very big and sparse, manned by only half a crew, but that hadn’t stopped the remaining ones from celebrating their victory. Jonas raised his glass at her as she boarded, but the look on her face prevented any of them from trying to reel her into the festivities. Instead, they allowed her to go below deck, towards the brig.

Harry met her halfway down the narrow corridor. “Welcome back, Captain,” he said, with only a smidge of his usual swagger, and a distinctly frustrated edge to his shoulders. Uma noted that, like her, he was splattered with someone else’s blood.

“How’s our guest doing?” she asked.

His eye twitched slightly. “He’s a stubbornly tight-lipped bastard, I’ll give him that,” he said.

“Yeah, I thought as much,” she sighed.

“But I can still crack him,” Harry promised, spinning his hook around on one finger. Uma considered him for a moment, wondering how far to let him go. It occurred to her that she’d never actually _seen_ how far he could go. She’d always been there to reel him back in, temper his most violent impulses, and he’d always obeyed. He wore his brutality like armour, but was always so eager to take it off when she asked. Uma realised, then, that she didn’t want to see how far he would go. There had been enough blood shed today, and she was tired.

“Lemme see him,” she said.

He hesitated, eyeing her up and down. No doubt taking in all her bloodstains, bruises, and general air of weariness. “He’ll still be here tomorrow, Captain,” he said, unusually gentle.

“Sure, but I think the king will want some answers before tomorrow.”

Harry bristled. “The king can suck my …”

“Harry! Look, let’s just get this over with, okay? Then we can go have a drink with the crew and put an end to this stupid day.”

His shoulders slumped. “Aye, Captain.”

Uma didn’t wait any longer before striding into the brig. Gil immediately snapped to attention. Their prisoner barely glanced up, not even bothering to straighten up as much as his ropes would allow. He looked to be in a similar state to Uma, his face a mess of cuts and bruises, his eyes utterly exhausted. But at least _she_ wasn’t tied to a chair.

“Oh, Harry,” she tutted, pretending to be concerned. “Didn’t I tell you to chill?”

He raised his hook threateningly, a playful look in his eyes that only she could see. “You test my patience, Captain! The rat bastard scunner’s lucky he’s still got a tongue in his head!”

“Yeah, and he’ll need it to talk,” she said pointedly.

“He don’t need eyes to talk,” her first mate snarled, swiping his hook close enough to Fang’s eyes that he had to blink.

Uma caught his wrist and he pretended to wrench it away in frustration. “We don’t cause unnecessary damage on my ship, Harry. Remember that.”

Harry puffed his chest out, ready to reply in an overblown fashion, and Gil was staring at them from the corner with unabashed glee, but at that moment Fang finally spoke up.

“Save it,” he said quietly. “I don’t need the good-cop-bad-cop performance. I know it’s bullshit.”

Uma glanced at him. “You think I’m good cop? Cute.”

He lapsed back into sullen silence. She folded her arms and shrugged. “Okay, fine. I’ve got things to do and better people than you to beat up. Why don’t you save us both the trouble and tell me who’s in your little club? What was it called again?”

More silence from the prisoner, but Gil raised his hand like he was in a classroom. “Oh, it’s the Original Alliance!”

Uma sighed and closed her eyes. “Thank you, Gil, but I actually need Toothy hear to give me the answers.”

Gil lowered his hand slowly. “Oh. Sorry.”

Fang just raised an eyebrow, looking amused. He was still tied to a chair with a busted lip and multiple cuts running across his neck, so he had no business raising eyebrows at anybody. And yet, here he was, acting like they were the dumbasses when he’d spent his day failing at an escape attempt because some little kid had tried to choke him out.

Uma exchanged a glance with Harry. “You know what? I don’t think he needs balls to talk either.”

Fang _did_ recoil slightly at that, but recovered quickly. “Takes balls to torture someone properly,” he sneered. “You’re all pathetic.”

Harry stepped forward and punched him in the face. It clearly wasn’t the first time, but Uma didn’t blame him. He then gathered up the man’s hair in his hand and yanked it back, pushing his face in close. “You want to repeat that?”

Fang just huffed a laugh. “I _said,_ you’re pathetic. You think that thing scares me?” His eyes darted towards the hook and back. “I used to think you were a rabid dog, but you’re just a kicked puppy trying to walk on its hind legs.”

Uma narrowed her eyes. An idea popped into her head, and she wasn’t super confident on it, but there wasn’t much to lose here. After all, one of the stowaways _had_ been dressed like a pirate. That, in and of itself, wasn’t unusual. There were plenty of pirates on the Isle, and wannabe pirates, and also people who just liked dressing up as pirates. Hers was the only legitimate crew around, these days. But she wasn’t the first, and from the look of it, Fang was way too familiar with being threatened with a hook. “Oh, right,” she said, casually interrupting Harry before he could kill their prisoner for real. “Just out of interest, how _did_ James Hook get wrapped up in this, anyway?”

Harry froze and shot her betrayed look. But Uma was focussed on Fang, and the brief, miniscule flash of shock that crossed his face before he could conceal it. Finally, she felt a small thrill of triumph. Uma smirked at him. “So, a Hun and a Pirate. _That_ must be fun. What are club meetings like, anyway? Surely there must be someone else there to mediate?”

Fang’s jaw clenched shut, and Uma knew, instinctively, that she wouldn’t get anywhere further with him tonight. Short of actually throwing him overboard, there was nothing more she could actually threaten him with, and maybe Ben would be kind of pissed if she fed their only informant to the sharks.

The thought of Ben made her remember the tablet, sitting heavy in her belt. It hadn’t buzzed for a while now. Maybe that was a good sign. But probably not.

“Okay, well,” she said, stepping back. “Thanks for the talk. Super enlightening. Why don’t we call it a night?”

Fang didn’t respond, glaring at the floor of the brig instead. Uma nodded at Gil. “I’ll send someone down to replace you soon.”

He smiled and shrugged. “I’m good for a while longer, Captain.”

Gil was good at watching prisoners. He never seemed to get bored and therefore could be counted on not to get lazy. He spent the hours natterring away about whatever came to mind, as if he and his charge were old friends. But he never got so friendly that he was tempted to let them go. He was just doing his job. Nothing personal. Still, he’d had a long day too, and from the dark look on Harry’s face, Uma had the sinking suspicion that he’d need Gil for company tonight rather than herself.

“One hour,” she said, and Gil just nodded amiably.

She followed Harry out of the brig. He strode ahead of her, tense and silent. Finally, just as they were about to reach the stairs, he stopped abruptly and punched the wall. “Fuck!” he hissed.

Uma watched him warily for a moment. He’d never hurt her. But sometimes it didn’t hurt to give him some space, especially in times like this when his eyes were distant and hazy, caught up in the past and his own deep insecurities. Catch him by surprise at the wrong time, and he wouldn’t even see her; he’d just lash out.

“Harry,” she said, after a minute. “Harry, it’s okay.”

He slumped against the wall and twisted his hook in his hands. Ironic, that such a thing gave him comfort, when the man who gave it to him was the cause of his distress. But Uma knew things about Harry that no one else did. She knew the hook had been his first and only real gift, dropped into his chubby three-year-old hands without care if he’d cut himself on it or poke his own eye out. She knew he’d clutched it like a teddy bear, curled up in some dark corner of his dad’s ship while the man raged and howled uncontrollably.

Harry shot her a pained look. “Are ye’ sure it’s him?”

She nodded. “Yeah. I mean, it was a guess, but Fang’s face confirmed it.”

He snorted humourlessly. “No wonder the bastard wasn’t scared of me.”

“I thought you were pretty scary,” she offered, but it sounded lame.

Harry shook his head. “This could be bad, Uma. If he’s involved and he wants to get off an island, then anyone who gets in his way might just be fucked.”

Uma grimaced. He wasn’t wrong. Hook Senior was a mad old drunk, and he hadn’t been a threat in years, but when he set his mind on something? He was basically unstoppable. All it would take was the right incentive. And, unlike Harry, his violence wasn’t uncontrollable. He could be cold, calculating, and very cruel.

“We’re stronger,” she said. “And smarter. And we got the numbers.”

“Against all of them?” he wondered out loud, uncharacteristically cynical.

Uma went quiet. She’d always thought all the old folks were totally broken. Apparently, like their children, all it took was a bit of hope to bring them out of the shadows. “We’ll figure it out,” she insisted. “Like we did today.”

He remained quiet, and Uma, to her horror, felt a lump rise in her throat. “Do you trust me?” she asked, hating the plaintive tone to her voice.

At this, Harry’s eyes snapped to her, impossibly piercing and blue. Slowly, he framed her face with his hands. “Aye,” he whispered. “You’re my hero, Uma.”

He squeezed her eyes shut and leaned forward, allowing herself to be weak just this once. Just like him. There were no false facades or barriers between them, not when it counted. They embraced for a long minute, feeling the rock of the ship and listening to the sounds of their crew still celebrating up on deck. For one moment, it was okay.

They let each other go eventually, and Harry took himself off to brood in the crow’s nest, or whatever. He mostly took comfort from company rather than isolation, but even he had his moments. So did Uma. She didn’t feel like being with the crew right now either, so she went back to her own cabin.

It was only in the dim silence of her room that she realised she’d run out of excuses not to talk to Ben. Sliding down to sit against the door, she pulled out the mirror tablet and stared at it for a moment. Her own face stared back in the dull black reflection, looking haggard and defeated. Uma let her head thump back against the door, just once, and forced herself to get a grip. Then, she pressed the call button.

It took a while to get an answer, and she began to half-hope, half-dread that he wouldn’t pick up. But eventually, King Ben’s face swam into focus. He looked about as awful as she did.

 _“Uma,”_ he said, sounding both weary and incredibly relieved. _“Are you okay?”_

She shrugged. “Fine. Big day, though. I foiled an evil plan, volunteered at a hospital, and tortured a prisoner for information. Having a kind of identity crisis, actually.”

To his credit, Ben didn’t even twitch at the torture comment. He just kept on looking tired. His voice sounded slightly hoarse, too, as if he’d been yelling a lot. _“You did great today, Uma. The kids said they’d never have left, if it weren’t for you and your people.”_

She shifted uncomfortably. “They okay?”

_“Yeah. I mean, they were a little jittery when they first got here, but Evie and the guys got them settled. They’ll be fine.”_

Uma sighed. “Cut to the chase, Ben. Why do you look so goddamn miserable?”

He rubbed his face with one hand. _“Right. Yeah. I, uh. I tried to call earlier, but then I was called to a Council meeting. It went for hours, only just finished.”_

Uma knew what was coming before he even said it. She’d known all day, actually, ever since the limo drove off and the barrier closed around it. _“Uma, I’m sorry. I tried to fight it, but. They’re stalling the relocation program.”_

“Stalling,” she said blankly. “For how long?”

_“I … I don’t know. Until I can convince them otherwise, I guess. But until then, no one sets foot on the Isle. And no one leaves.”_


	10. Facades

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Evie and Ben consider their next move. Uma considers how much she's willing to give.

Image was everything. That was a belief that Evie’s mom had instilled in her from the moment she was born, and Evie had yet to see it be proven wrong.

Evie’s mom had told her a lot of things – that she was worthless without her beauty, that she was stupid, that people were tools, and that love was a power game and nothing more. The Isle had reinforced most of those ideas, and Evie had woven her life around them. She’d had to, in order to survive. Now in Auradon, she found herself having to stop and comb through those thoughts and beliefs, like picking rotten threads out of beautiful piece of fabric. Sometimes it was too hard and the whole thing unravelled. Like that time in Ben’s office when she fell apart over her breakup with Doug. Embarrassing, but, as she later realised, unavoidable. Sometimes you had to take something apart a little bit and figure out where it all went wrong, before you could begin to redesign it.

Still, in some ways Auradon and the Isle were not that different. Image was still important – perhaps even more so. She only had to look at the tabloids and news articles to see proof of that.

The incident with the last VK transfer had spread like wildfire despite Ben and Fairy Godmother’s best efforts, and it had only grown bigger with each retelling. People heard that there had been a barrier breach, that Auradon had nearly been invaded by some of the worst villains from the Isle, and that a squadron of guards had been massacred. All so a bunch of undeserving, no-good villain children could come to Auradon.

The people hadn’t taken it well.

Evie stared, aghast, at the tabloid Dizzy had just dropped onto her desk, with a candid shot of Ben splashed across the front. He was walking away from the camera, his mouth twisted unhappily to the side. The caption read, _KING BEN DOUBLES DOWN ON VILLAIN CHILD RELOCATION, FACES ONGOING CRITICISM._ It was a bad photo. Evie hadn’t realised that Ben could _take_ a bad photo. She’d certainly never seen one without him smiling, before. In smaller print, beside a cut-out photo of Mal showing off her most wicked smirk, it said. _True love or hypnosis? Is the King’s new consort to blame for Auradon’s new policy direction?_

It wasn’t unusual for Mal to get a bad rap from the press. In fact, she seemed to take particular delight in it, often laughing over the more outlandish claims with Evie late at night in their room, and then going on social media under a fake account to stir up some more shit. But it was unusual for Ben to get this kind of scrutiny. He was the public’s darling, the one they all fawned over. It was part of the reason, he once told her, why he’d been crowned years earlier than planned.

While Evie continued to stare in horror, she became aware that Dizzy was still standing there, twisting her hands together guiltily. “I wouldn’t have given it to you,” she said. “Only some of our recent designs are featured on page four and you were looking forward to that for ages.”

“Oh, right. Thank you, Dizzy. No, don’t look at me like that, I’m not upset with you,” she said, trying on a reassuring smile. It didn’t quite fit right, and Dizzy could obviously tell – her own smile wasn’t as bright as usual. Evie deliberately opened up the magazine and flicked to the right page, allowing them both a few minutes to squeal excitedly over their creations.

She’d been lucky, as far as public scrutiny went. There had been some initial fear-mongering and hand-wringing over her appointment as the Isle rep, but somehow, Ben had become the focus of their relocation program. Probably because he had no chill about it whatsoever. Evie, meanwhile, held fast to her smile and managed to fly under the radar. It was only a matter of time, though. Then _nobody_ would want to buy her clothes.

Perhaps noticing her distraction, Dizzy stopped pointing at a piece of jewellery and looked up at Evie. “You okay?”

“Hmm? Yeah, I’m fine.”

The younger girl gave her a wry look.

Evie sighed. “I’m sorry. It’s just, all this stuff with the program is playing on my mind. None of it’s working out the way I’d wanted it too.”

“Well, you got me out,” Dizzy reminded her. “And a bunch of other kids. That’s something, right?”

Evie tried another smile. “It is. Of course it is. How are the others doing? You share some classes, right?”

Dizzy winced slightly. “Um, okay I think? I haven’t seen much of them this week. The ones in my year had to take extra Remedial Goodness classes after Carlisle broke that window.”

“Ah.”

“Yeah.”

Evie wasn’t surprised. None of the new VKs were settling as well as she’d hoped, even after almost two weeks. Most of them were belligerent, antisocial, and set off by the smallest thing. Anthony Tremaine was the sole exception, probably because he was the oldest, but even he just up and walked out of class sometimes when he got fed up with it. Fairy Godmother had been fairly patient with them thus far, but not all of the teachers were. And it was only a matter of time before the school started getting complaints from parents.

“What would help, do you think?” she asked Dizzy. “More clubs? More mentoring? A different curriculum?”

Dizzy shrugged.

“What helped you?” Evie persisted, slightly desperate.

Dizzy scrunched her face up, looking confused. “I don’t know? I got everything I wanted by coming here. It wasn’t easy, like, everything being different and being away from Mom and Auntie and Anthony was hard, but you were here. So it was okay.” She glanced down, looking glum. “Sorry I can’t be more helpful.”

“No. No, it’s fine. I shouldn’t be dumping my worries on you anyway.”

“I want to help, though!”

Evie wrapped an arm around her shoulders and showed her the magazine again. “You have been the biggest help. _Evie’s 4 Hearts_ would have tanked without you.”

Dizzy grinned brightly, and Evie tried to take comfort in the fact that at least _one_ person was happy.

The younger girl soon left to go do homework, and Evie found that she couldn’t concentrate when left alone. She tapped her pen against the magazine, trying to remember what had helped her to adjust to Auradon. Of course, they’d had the evil plan to keep them on track to begin with, but that had only been for the first couple of weeks. Once they’d made the choice to defy their parents and stay, it had been surprisingly easy to just … stay.

She supposed, like Dizzy, that she’d actually wanted to come in the first place, and unlike Mal, Carlos or Jay, her mother had more or less prepared her for it for years. She’d been groomed to be a princess (or her mother’s idea of a princess, at any rate), and even though it hadn’t been quite what she expected, it was miles better than the Isle she’d left behind. Then it turned out to be even better than she’d expected, because she’d discovered her own talents and abilities, and Doug had been there to appreciate her for it.

Jay had had his sports and Carlos had had Dude. Mal, of course, had Ben. Actually, they’d all had Ben a little bit. He’d stuck up for them, believed in them, and weathered their worst impulses. It hadn’t _fixed_ any of them, but it had helped. Maybe if he wasn’t so caught up in all this nonsense with the Council and the public, he’d have more time for the new VKs, and that would help them, too.

Sighing, Evie picked up the magazine and went to go find him.

She knew he was having a bad day when she rounded the corridor of his wing and heard him yelling from fifteen yards away. It must be a week of (unwanted) firsts, because Ben wasn’t prone to yelling, any more than he was prone to taking bad photos, or being criticised by the public. Evie stopped to take a fortifying breath before making her way down the corridor, deliberately letting the click of her heels echo through the empty hallway. Sure enough, the loud voices abruptly stopped as she got to the door. The last thing she heard was, “Dad I gotta go. We’ll talk about it later.” Wincing, Evie raised her hand to knock.

“Hey, Evie,” he said distractedly as she let herself inside. He was still on his feet and looked like he’d been pacing around the office, phone in hand.

“Tough conversation?”

He made a wry face and sat down heavily in his chair. “I don’t think I remember the last time I had an easy conversation with him.”

“Was it about the last Council meeting?”

He rubbed his eyes. “I wish it was. Then at least we’d be fighting over something useful. But no, he was more interested in telling me off for some stupid tabloids.”

Evie brandished her magazine. “This one?”

Ben glanced at it dispassionately. “Yeah, or one similar. Like that stuff even matters.”

“Well.” Evie fidgeted with the edge of the glossy paper. “It matters a _little_ bit. I mean, negative press means that the public won’t support the program, which means the Council representatives won’t vote to get it started again any time soon. Right?”

“They won’t vote for it anyway,” Ben said. “All this is just another excuse.”

“But we can’t just give up!”

“I’m not, Evie. I promise. I’m just … prioritising.” He looked out the window, his eyes distant. Evie felt a pang of guilt for how _tired_ he looked. It was all too much for one person, even if they were the king. Fighting for the program, fighting to keep the Isle Centre open, fighting with his father … no wonder he had no time left to babysit the new VKs.

“I’ve been thinking …” he said, then cleared his throat. When Evie just tilted her head at him and waited, he gave her a somewhat shifty look before trying again. “I’ve been thinking that maybe … we should just keep going ahead with the relocation.”

Evie blinked, uncomprehending. “But the program’s been stalled.”

“Yeah, um. Officially.”

“So …” she drawled. “How do we get the kids off, then?”

He shrugged, attempting to be casual and failing quite miserably. “Well it’s not _that_ hard to sneak onto the Isle. I mean, we managed when we had to go get Mal, right? And if Uma’s on board, then we should be able to sneak off the Isle as well.”

Evie stared at him for a long moment. “Ben, are you saying you want to go against the council? Against your _dad_?”

“Well, yeah. I guess I am.”

For one moment, she was excited. Shocked and terrified, sure, but excited. They could do it. They could make it happen. No more waiting for stupid Auradon policies, no more playing nice for the Council, no more limited numbers – they could get as many children out as they wanted. They could bring them to Auradon, and then … and then …

“No,” she said.

He looked poleaxed. “No?”

“No, Ben. We can’t. It wouldn’t work.”

“Why not?” he demanded.

“Where would we put them? They won’t be allowed in the school!”

“Fairy Godmother wouldn’t turn them away. Not if they were already here,” he said. “And if she did, well, we could just keep them somewhere safe for a while until things got sorted out.”

“You mean _hide_ them?”

“Just for a bit. People have already volunteered to take them in. Esmeralda, the dwarves, some of the fairies …”

Evie pressed her hands to her forehead and paced back and forth. “Oh, Ben. No. No, no, no, no, no. We can’t work like that, it’s not _right_.”

“To hell with right!” he snapped, startling her into a halt. “Every day we wait, we’re leaving kids at risk! I can’t just keep doing nothing.”

He looked tired, and desperate, and beyond caring. Evie knew this must be weighing on him heavily, for him to be suggesting something so blatantly wrong. Either that, or he was being influenced. She folded her arms and glanced at the mirror tablet on his desk. “Was this Uma’s idea?”

“What? No. I haven’t even talked to her about it yet. But she’d help, I know she would.”

“Of course she would,” she muttered. Taking a deep breath, Evie held her hands out placatingly. “Ben, listen. I know you want to do the right thing for these kids, but bringing them here illegally is not the way to do it. They wouldn’t have what we have. They wouldn’t get to go to school, or make new friends, or know what it’s like to thrive somewhere safe. They’d just be living with a different kind of fear, right up until your dad or whoever sent them back again.”

“I wouldn’t let that happen,” he said, but there was a flicker of doubt in his eyes.

She reached over and gripped his hands, trying to reach him. “Most kids on the Isle spend their life feeling hunted. Don’t make them feel that way here, too.”

He sighed and slumped forward, his hand briefly tightening over hers. “You’re right. I know you are, it’s just … I hate doing nothing.”

“Yeah, me too.” Evie let their hands linger for a moment, relieved that he was listening to her, and overcome with a brief surge of fondness for him. Their eyes met, and they managed a small smile for each other. Then Evie realised the moment was dragging on a bit, and purposefully drew back, glancing away from him. Warmth was blooming under her skin, but it was undercut by a deep, ache in her stomach. Evie ignored it, letting it dissipate rather than settle int something familiar. “Maybe there’s another way,” she said briskly.

“I’m open to anything,” he said. Then, with a weary chuckle, “I never thought you’d be talking me out of something devious.”

“Now, now. I didn’t say we couldn’t be devious. Just not _illegal_.”

“There’s a difference?”

Evie stood up and went to the window, with its impressive view over the Auradon Prep grounds. Down on the ground, she spotted Dizzy in her bright, mismatched outfit. The girl strode was walking across the grass, towards a large tree on the edge of the forest. Evie could just barely see Anthony Tremaine’s red hair beneath the foliage. Dizzy crouched down beside him for a moment, then dragged him out by the hand. He went with her back towards the school, patiently holding on as she swung their arms back and forth.

_Family is what helps._ The thought seemed to come out of nowhere, surprising her. But then she realised that it had been floating around in her brain for a while now, ever since she’d pondered why some VKs adjusted to Auradon and others didn’t. The tangled clumps of thread in her head smoothed out, and suddenly, she could see a new pattern emerging. _I had my family with me. Mal, Jay, Carlos._ _Anthony has Dizzy. Who do the others have?_

“I wonder,” she started. Ben looked at her curiously. “I wonder if we could still ask those people to take the children in. Not just for convenience, but, like, to be a family for them. Do you think they would?”

Ben nodded slowly. “Most would, I’m sure.”

“I think that would help, you know? If they had a proper home.”

“It’s a great idea. But we’ve still got the same problem. How do we get them here?”

Evie gnawed on her knuckle. It was a bad habit that her mom used to rap her on the hand for, but right now she didn’t care. Out the window, Dizzy had dragged Anthony in another direction, and it took her a moment to realise she was approaching Carlisle Clayton. He was by himself in the middle of the field, hacking at the ground with what looked like a Tourney stick. For a minute Evie was frightened that Dizzy would get whacked in the head with the stick, but he stopped to talk to her, or maybe just listen. After a minute, Dizzy bounced away with Anthony in tow. Once she was out of sight, Carlisle dropped the stick and ran after her.

“No one’s allowed to set foot on the Isle,” she said. “But what if we collected them _off_ the Isle?”

He made a confused face. “Like … in the water?”

“Like on a _ship_.”

He thought about that for a moment. Then it hit him, and he grinned. “Devious,” he said. “But not illegal.”

She smirked. “It’s all about the image, Ben.”

_

“No,” Uma said.

On the tablet screen, Ben looked like a candlestick that had just been doused with a bucket of cold water. _“No?”_

“Did I stutter?” she demanded. “No. En-Oh. Not doing it.”

_“Oh. Okay, then.”_

Uma narrowed her eyes and glared at him. “What, that’s it? Where’s the big, motivational speech?”

He shrugged one shoulder, his eyes already looking off into the distance, as if going back to the metaphorical drawing board. _“No means no. I’m not going to make you do something you don’t want to do. I’m not surprised, honestly.”_

“Oh yeah? Why’s that?”

_“Well, it would be a huge personal risk to you, and your crew. And it shouldn’t be your responsibility. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have asked. I’ll let you know once Evie and I have come up with another solution.”_

He went to switch the tablet off, and Uma spoke without thinking. “Wait.”

He paused, his finger hovering over the ‘end call’ button. Uma wished she could smack it away. “What are the chances of finding another way?” she asked grudgingly.

Ben sighed heavily. _“Best chance? We wait another four months until I turn eighteen.”_

“And then you’ll have the power to make it happen?”

_“Well, technically. I’d still have to listen to the Council, but I could pull rank in cases where it’s absolutely necessary. This, of course, would fall under the ‘necessary’ column.”_

_Yeah, until they bring out the guillotine,_ she thought, thinking of all the recent, passive-aggressive news reports. Sure, they censored the most inflammatory, anti-royal stuff, but Uma could read between the lines. As much power as Ben had, she knew it could all be taken away at any time. They got rid of his dad when he went out of fashion, after all. And if they got rid of Ben, who would stand up for the Isle? Who would listen to Uma? “We can’t wait four months,” was what she said, instead of voicing her true thoughts. “This place is a timebomb. We’re having brawls every day, people keep attacking the Centre, and word on the street is that the OA is planning a new attack.”

He shrugged helplessly. _“I’ll keep arguing. That’s all I can promise. I’m sorry, Uma.”_

She glanced around her ship, at the scant remains of her crew. Most of them were out patrolling the streets in pairs, or guarding the centre. Some of them were _in_ the centre, being tended to by Dr Sweet. “When are the guards getting picked up?” she asked abruptly.

Ben consulted his computer, frowning slightly. “ _Next week at the earliest,”_ he said.

“So who’s getting them? If no one’s supposed to set foot here?”

His mouth twisted unhappily. _“Dad – the High King’s talking about sending thirty men. Armed with, uh, guns.”_

Uma froze in alarm. Guns were unheard of on the Isle. They weren’t commonly used in Auradon either, Ben had once told her. Only in the most urgent of circumstances. But that wouldn’t stop any the crazy old folks from making a move, or any other desperate Isle residents, for that matter. All it would take was one wrong move, and if a single bullet was fired – Uma could see the chaos right now. “People will die,” she said. “Guaranteed.”

_“Would a smaller group be safer?”_ he asked.

Uma wanted to kick the wall in frustration. “No. I mean, maybe. If my crew provided cover, it might be.”

_“That puts you at risk, though.”_

“We’re already at risk,” she snapped. “Isn’t that why we’re trying to get all these damn kids out of here?”

He rubbed his eyes. _“Yeah. We’re trying.”_

Uma resisted the urge to fling the tablet out to sea. It wasn’t the first time; when Ben first told her the program had been stalled, she’d resolved to never speak to him again. That had lasted almost twenty-four hours. The next day, after she’d gotten black-out drunk and woken up with a vicious hangover, she’d called him out of sheer habit to relieve her frustrations. Loathe as she was to admit it, Uma was committed to this shit-show. She couldn’t give up now – not while he was still willing to give her a chance. “Fine,” she growled.

_“Huh?”_

“I said fine. I’ll round up the next batch of kids and ship them out to … what, the edge of the barrier?”

_“You don’t have to,”_ he said hurriedly, failing to hide the spark of hope in his eyes. _“If it’s too dangerous …”_

“We’ll need to find a secret place,” she said, ignoring him. “To leave from, and to meet at. I can’t take my ship, it’s too conspicuous. Also, we’re not sending six at a time anymore. That’s stupid. I’m putting in as many as we can fit in a tiny dingy, and if Princess Evie had a problem with that, she can kiss my …”

_“Uma,”_ he said, gently but firmly. _“Really. If it’s too much, just say so. We’ll find another way.”_

Uma glanced away. She realised, probably, that he wouldn’t think less of her for saying she couldn’t do it. But as far as her pride was concerned, that ship had sailed. Uma, daughter of Ursula, has already agreed to this, and her word was binding. “Just shut up and let me know when you’ve found a place to meet.”

He tried not to let his relief show, but the slump of his shoulders was impossible to miss – as was the soft look in his eyes. _“I will. Thank you, Uma.”_

She switched the tablet off without a reply. Some things were better left unsaid.


	11. Venturing Forth

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uma sees a witch doctor. Evie deals with a lot of feelings. Ben tries to mend his image a litte, but it's not off to a great start.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your patience guys! This chapter took longer than I expected. Also, say hi to Celia! I don't know if I have a handle on her character yet since the new movie isn't out, but I loved her in the promo. Besides, it just occurred to me that Uma doesn't have a lot of girls or women to talk to on the Isle and I wanted to rectify that ... even if the girl in question is a pain in Uma's butt.

Uma knew she was in for an interesting night (and by interesting, she meant damn frustrating and not at all what she needed right now, thank you very much) when Gil returned to the ship without his money, his sword, or his shirt. He shrank back when she confronted him on the gangplank.

“Uh, hi Captain.”

“What happened?” she said, in a tone that brooked no arguments. Gil was a lot more observant than people gave him credit for. He didn’t get robbed easily, but could, on occasion, be persuaded to give stuff away.

He scuffed his foot sheepishly. “Got a tarot reading,” he said.

It said a lot for how much Uma had to think about right now, that those words made no sense whatsoever. All she could do was stare at him, trying to connect _tarot_ to _shirtless._ It wasn’t until Bonnie groaned and recalled the time she’d been fleeced by a witch doctor that Uma’s brain clicked. “That’s where you’ve been all afternoon?” she demanded. “At Facilier’s Arcade?”

He just shrugged, ashamed. “You said to look for secret spots on the Isle. I just thought the Shadow Man might know where to start.”

“Yeah, except you missed the fact that he ain’t giving any information away for free. Or for anything, actually.” She rolled her eyes and waved her hand dismissively. “Well, it’s gone now. I’m not starting shit with Dr Facilier just to get your stuff back. We got enough enemies right now.”

“It was little Celia, actually,” he said.

“Oh my God, seriously? That’s even more embarrassing, Gil. You should know better!”

“Well I dunno, she was just sitting there all lonely – I think she and Dizzy Tremaine were friends, you know, I always saw them hanging out – so I said I’d do one little reading, and it was freaky, Uma! She said she knew we were looking for a secret spot, and said she’d take me there!”

“And then?” she said mockingly.

“And … then she wanted my money. Then I ran out money so I gave her my sword. The she wanted _more_ so I just took my shirt off.”

Uma stared at him. “And _then_?”

“Then she ran off,” Gil finished despondently. “And I didn’t have any coins left so I couldn’t go into the Arcade and talk to her dad.”

She was about to shake her head and turn away, already occupied with more important matters. Like finding some mythical place on the Isle that would somehow allow them to transport boatloads of guards and kids to the barrier without any of the old folks finding out. Before she could dismiss him entirely, though, Gil said, “Oh and she gave me this. To prove she wasn’t lying.”

Uma glanced back, and saw him holding out a scroll of paper. Sighing, she snatched the scroll out of his hands and unrolled it. She squinted at it for a moment, trying to make sense of the squiggly lines, dots and markings. It was a rough depiction of the Island, she could see that much. Maybe what the Island _used_ to be, before King Beast had mutilated it into a prison, without all its buildings, streets and shops. There was a line leading from the dead centre of the Isle to a spot on the very bottom – which had been torn clean off.

“A map!” Harry said, abruptly materialising beside her. For such an unsubtle person, he was awfully good at that. Other crew members gathered around, suddenly interested.

“A map of what?” Uma asked.

Gil looked slightly more optimistic by everyone’s reactions. “To a secret spot, I think? I don’t know, Celia said to come find her if we wanted the missing piece.”

She lowered the scroll abruptly. “And what does she want for it?”

He shrugged. “I don’t know. Hey, does anyone have a spare jacket? It’s getting kind of cold. I don’t need sleeves though, just the bit that covers the chest.”

_

“Ow. Ow, that hurts.”

“Just hold still.”

“Ow! God, Evie, watch the needles!”

She sighed in exasperation. “It’s just your zipper. No sharp edges. And if you held _still_ for a moment, it wouldn’t hurt!”

She watched Mal pout in the mirror. “Well it’s cold, okay?”

Ignoring her, Evie tried to concentrate on her task. Somewhere underneath all that violet tulle, there as a zipper, and beyond that, there were Mal’s shoulder blades, tight with tension as she endured the torture of her personal stylist. Finally, Evie managed to zip the fabric up, and set to smoothing the layers down with her hands. “There. All done!”

Mal immediately stomped away from the mirror without bothering to admire the final product, so Evie did it for her. She appraised the purple dress, with its sleek, sharp bodice and voluminous skirt. She was particularly proud of the amethysts sewn into the lining. Among them, a single emerald was placed in the very centre of her bodice, right above her chest. It glowed brightly in the late afternoon sun of their dorm room. Evie found herself mesmerised by it, and then realised exactly where she was staring and turned away.

“What?” Mal grumbled, pulling on her gloves.

“Nothing. You just look very pretty, that’s all.” Evie pursed her lips in a tight smile, ignoring how her insides shrivelled up in embarrassment. “And it’s so you! Ben’s going to be thrilled.”

Mal snorted. “Yeah, he better be. I promised him _one night_ of playing nice to the snobs and the press, and he’d better enjoy every inch of it.”

Evie was conflicted, because on the one hand, Mal really ought to understand how precarious their position was. This ball was a social event, yes, but it was also their chance to charm the public and the representatives, and somehow convince them not to cancel the VK program for good. Mal knew that. On the other hand, Evie couldn’t begrudge Mal being honest, even if it meant being blunt and uncompromising. She hadn’t realised how much she’d missed the real Mal until she’d gone back to the Isle. Hadn’t realised how much she _loved_ her.

Evie was good at a lot of things. Biology, dress-making, smiling, and theoretical physics were among her many intellectual pursuits. One thing she was particularly good at, though, was pining.

Evie hadn’t known it was pining, before she’d come to Auradon. Before that, she’d had no name for the warm, tight, and yet somehow hollow feeling in her chest that bloomed whenever she looked at Mal. She’d assumed it was a misplaced feeling of sisterhood for someone who considered her a minion, perhaps an ally (on a good day) and nothing more. Then they’d come here, and Mal had talked about her feelings for Ben. And Evie had realised, yes, okay, this was what it felt like to love somebody and know, deep in her heart, that they would never love you back. Evie had swallowed, smiled, and given Mal her utmost support. After all, Mal deserved Ben’s love, even if she thought she didn’t.

Evie could live with her pining. It was almost a part of her identity, set into the very bedrock of her bones. She suspected that she’d be living with it until the day she died.

There was a knock on the door. Evie made sure she was all good to go – hair, makeup and dress in order – before going to answer it. When she opened the door, Ben stood there with a handful of personal guards at is back. Evie barely noticed them, though – all she could see was Ben, and his smile, and the bags under his eyes that he’d valiantly covered up with the makeup she’d given him. “Good evening, ladies,” he said, as charming as ever.

“Hi, Ben,” she drawled, teasing him.

His smile morphed into a grin, and she felt her heart stutter. Fortunately, Mal came over and his attention was captured by her beauty and curmudgeonly resentment. They shared a kiss and Evie may well have been one of the guards posted behind them, for how unfazed she appeared. Then, horrible boy that he was, he held one elbow out for Mal and one out for Evie, and what kind of personal designer-slash-political partner would she be to refuse it?

They went outside to the school to the limo, and paparazzi cameras began to spawn. Evie reluctantly let go of Ben’s arm and stood back, allowing him to “help” Mal into the car. She gave the reporters a little spiel about how exciting the evening was and how positive she felt about it, skilfully ignoring the pointed jabs about recent public opinion. She then pretended not to notice Ben and Mal beckoning her to sit beside them, and instead climbed gracefully into the seat across from them.

Once the door had closed, Ben blew out a rush of air, and rubbed Mal’s hands between his own. Her skin was always slightly cold; Evie knew from experience. “Okay,” he said. “This is it, guys. Let’s give these people a show.”

“What kind of a show?” Mal asked teasingly, trailing one manicured finger down his arm. Evie glanced away.

“The nice, PC, respectable kind,” he said, taking her hand and giving her knuckles a kiss. “Until ten pm, anyway.”

“Ugh, fine.” She slouched down as much as her corset would allow.

Evie stared out the window, twisting her hands in her lap. “This is important,” she said, half to her own reflection in the window. “This is very, very important.”

“Hey,” Ben said. She glanced over out of habit, and found both of them looking at her, earnest and (unusually for Mal) very open. He looked very handsome in his navy suit, and she was a vision in purple. “It’ll be okay.”

Evie swallowed. She was good at pining. She was world class. She was … underqualified for this. Two people, and in a relationship, no less? Her best friend, and the purest boy in the world? Not fair. Evie’s mother had taught her a lot, but she’d never explained how to deal with feelings like this. There were too many, and Evie was too small to hold them all. Out of sheer practice, she forced a smile onto her face. “Of course.”

It was going to be a long night.

_

Ben had been attending balls since he was born. He enjoyed them, generally, though they’d become much more fun since his new friends from the Isle had arrived. Villain attacks and hostile takeovers aside, having Mal, Evie, Jay and Carlos there helped everyone to loosen up a bit and really party like the teenagers they were.

Tonight wasn’t really supposed to be a party, through. Actually, he needed to do his damnedest to prove that he wasn’t just a teenager, but a mature, capable head of state. Apparently that meant relearning how to smile and be nice to people with different views, according to his father. Ben had wanted to refuse out of sheer stubbornness, but he knew that he couldn’t. It _was_ important to project a certain image to the public, even Evie had said as much. Besides, he liked being liked. It was kind of pathetic, actually, how much he’d taken it for granted before, and how … hurtful it could feel, when it suddenly wasn’t there anymore.

Not that he’d admit that to anyone. Not with all the real problems they had on their hands.

At least both Mal and Evie were here, supporting him. They both looked radiant as they followed him out of the limo and made their way up the carpet towards the door of his parents’ new castle. Mal took his elbow again, but Evie took a step behind them. Ben awkwardly put his other elbow down, embarrassed by the impulse. Of course he couldn’t walk into the castle with both girls like that, no matter how much better it would make him feel. What would people say?

At least, Evie being there by herself meant that most of the reporters’ questions were directed at her rather than Ben, for better or worse.

“Evie! Miss Evie! Are you wearing your own design tonight?”

She twirled, letting the silk folds of her dress glimmer in the light. “I am indeed! But I must give most of the credit to my assistant, Dizzy Tremaine, for this one.” She winked at the camera, probably intended for Dizzy herself, who was no doubt watching on TV.

“And did Evie design your gown as well?” Another reporter asked, pushing her microphone way too close to Mal’s face for comfort. Ben would have sworn that they did that on purpose, given Mal’s latest antics with the press. But right now, she managed to swallow down her frustration and grin sharply back at them.

“As if anyone else in this kingdom could make me look this good,” she said, gently elbowing her best friend. Evie happily took the opportunity to pull Mal in close, squeezing her arm. Ben smiled helplessly at the two of them. There were days when he knew he couldn’t make Mal happy, no matter what he did. She carried too much darkness for him to fully understand. It was a relief to know that Evie would always be there for her when he couldn’t. Likewise, he knew that Mal was one of the few people in this kingdom who loved Evie for her intelligence and strength, the way she deserved. He was just happy that they had each other, and that he could be a part of their lives in some small way. In that moment, with one of Mal’s arms linked with him and her other linked with Evie’s, all felt right with the world.

Then, suddenly, a reporter asked something that made the smile slide right off his face.

“Are you here alone tonight, Miss Evie? You of all people?”

“No,” Mal snapped back before she could help herself. “She’s here with _us_.”

Evie patted her on the arm and drew away. “I don’t have a partner tonight,” she said, and clapped a hand to her face in lock surprise. “Oh my goodness, that’s what I forgot!”

That drew a smattering of laughs, but the reporter stayed laser-focussed, not giving up the hunt just yet. His eyes flicked from Evie to Mal and Ben, and then back again. Ben decided it was high time they were inside. “Time to join the party,” he said, moving the girls along. “My parents are expecting us.”

They made it five steps away before the reporter called out again, loud enough to be heard by them and everyone else in the immediate area. “Are harems common on the Isle, Mal? Evie? Is this something that you’re likely to introduce to Auradon if the population of Isle kids increases here?”

There was an awkward silence, and more than a few shocked looks. Ben closed his eyes briefly.

“Oh, I’ll introduce you to something,” Mal growled, her hands balling into fists.

Evie stepped forward before she could retaliate, and gave the reporter a cool smile. “I don’t think that’s anything you’d ever have to worry about.”

“Auradon?” he clarified.

“Yes, Auradon, but I meant you personally. You’re in no danger of acquiring a harem any time soon.”

She turned heel and marched the rest of the way to the front doors, her head held high. Ben and Mal followed along, the latter still bunched up with tension and practically radiating fury. He tried to feel relieved as they crossed the threshold into the brightly lit entrance hall, but as eyes swivelled towards them and the whispers started, he suspected that they were walking into just another pit of vipers.

_

Celia Facilier had a table at her dad’s arcade, and another table in the streets. This one was harder to find – she tended to move around. But Uma had seen her in a couple of regular places, so she had a pretty good idea of where to find her.

She came alone. Not only was it classless to intimidate a twelve-year-old with two burly boys, but she suspected that it wouldn’t be helpful. No, Celia had had a specific goal in mind when she’d invited Gil to sit with her, and Uma intended to figure out what it was.

“Hello,” Celia said as she approached, fanning her cards out. “May I tempt you to discover your destiny?”

“Cut the crap,” Uma said, crossing her arms.

Celia blinked. “Wow, rude.”

“Yeah, it’s my speciality.” She leaned over the small, wooden table. It might be classless to intimidate a prepubescent with older boys, but Uma herself had no such qualms. “Heard you had a run-in with my crewmate?”

Celia made a face that she probably thought was cute. “I’m sure I’ve seen many crewmembers. From all across the Isle. You’ll have to be more specific.”

“Tall, blonde, muscly. Not too bright,” Uma clarified, her teeth clenched.

“ _Oh_ ,” Celia said, grinning down at the table. “ _Him_.”

“Yeah, him. What’s your deal?”

He girl shrugged innocently. “Your boy wanted some direction. I gave it to him.”

“Direction where?”

Celia just smiled slow and catlike. “I could do a reading for you, if you want? It’ll cost you, though.”

Uma closed her eyes and prayed to someone for patience. She didn’t know who she was praying to – some old gods of what the Isle used to be, maybe. But it was enough to plonk herself down in the rickety chair opposite Celia Facilier. “Okay, fine. What’s your deal? You really know a secret way off this Isle?”

Celia started shuffling her cards. “Money?”

Uma sighed and dropped a couple of coins onto the table. Celia barely blinked, her hand shooting out to grab the coins and drag them out of sight. “Ahh, I see that the veil has opened,” she said.

Uma snorted loudly, and distinctly unladylike.

“Yes, I see,” Celia said, ignoring her and not even pretending to consult her cards. “I see … a path.”

“Path to where?” Uma asked shortly.

“Path to the edge of the map,” Celia said. He held her hand out, a piece of faded paper held between her forefinger and middle finger. Uma made a grab for it and she withdrew it quickly. “Maybe. For the right price.”

Uma was starting to regret leaving Gil and Harry behind. This little brat was testing her patience. “You want to skip the queue to Auradon?” she asked. “Is that it?”

Celia looked at her with hooded, cautious eyes. “Maybe.”

Uma blew out her breath, thinking it over. Celia wasn’t on the priority list; her dad wasn’t awful to her and she was provided for well enough, compared to plenty of others. Besides, she was trouble. Uma wouldn’t trust her to play nice with the Auradonians if someone payed her a million bucks. But Ben wouldn’t care about that if Celia gave away the location that would save all the other kids. In fact, she’d probably get a Royal Benefits Package. “Fine. Done. Now, give me that.”

Celia didn’t resist as the scrap of paper was torn from her hands. Uma unfurled and examined it quickly, just to be sure it was the right one. It looked like the edge of the docks close to her territory, where no one ever went, with the rest of the trail leading to a tiny skull. She stuffed it away quickly, just in case Celia had some buddies hidden away in the shadows.

“Where did you even get this?” Uma asked. “Or did you just draw it yourself?”

The girl shook her head. One of the cards stuck to her hat came loose and fluttered down; she nonchalantly added it to the deck. “Got it from one of my dad’s contacts. An old smuggler down by the water. Name’s Silver.”

Uma frowned. The name rang a bell, but she couldn’t place it. Couldn’t be a major villain. “Where the hell does he smuggle to? It’s a barricaded island.”

“I dunno. He’s always got a lot of stuff, though. He can move around the Isle real easy, never gets nabbed by the other pirates or gangs. Keeps to himself, doesn’t really have any loyalties or nothing.”

“How does someone with all that loot survive without allies?”

Celia examined her nails. “Why don’t you go ask him?”

Uma was starting to believe this guy didn’t exist at all, and Celia was playing her for a fool. But it wouldn’t hurt to explore more of the space below the docks, in case they did find a place that would be okay for loading kids up and shipping them out. So Uma stood up and planted her hands on the table again. “If this turns to shit and it’s your fault, I’ll be sending my boys around to pay you a visit.”

The girl crossed her arms and raised an unimpressed eyebrow. “My daddy don’t like me talking to boys.”

The implied threat made Uma grit her teeth. Of course, she didn’t have the resources to piss of Dr Facilier. But she just inclined her head matter-of-factly. “Well, just remember I’ve got your ticket off this rock. So don’t try me. Got it?”

Celia grinned and saluted her with one of her cards. Uma glared at her for a moment more, just to make sure the message had sunk in, before turning away. She found herself fiddling with the piece of paper in her pocket, and watching the shadows a little more closely than normal. It rankled that a twelve-year-old could unsettle her so. She knew there was no magic on the Isle; all the same, Facilier had adjusted remarkably well to the Isle without it. He and his daughter were both survivors, and if anyone had otherworldly resources to draw from, it would be them.

Uma just hoped she wasn’t walking into a trap, and taking her crew down with her.

 


	12. The Edge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uma goes on an adventure. Ben reaches breaking point.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everyone, I'm so sorry for the time it's taken to post this. Your patience and continued readership is invaluable. 
> 
> I haven't seen Descendents 3 yet, though I realise that we are now wildly off canon. Hopefully you will manage to stick with this story and these characterisations regardless.
> 
> Feedback, as always, is super important to me. Thank you!

The Isle was overcrowded. Almost every inch of space was used and re-used, cluttered with people and trash and _things_. It was partly why Uma loved the ocean so much – even if she couldn’t sail properly, she could look out into the wide, open, empty space and feel a little calmer. And every time she saw a news report from Auradon and spotted the long stretches of green fields in the background, she felt a sick surge of jealousy.

Still, there were a few places on the Isle that no one ever went. Little nooks and crannies, abandoned rooms, alleyways that an underfed child could barely squeeze their shoulders into. Places so dirty and disgusting that even the worst villains were reluctant to set foot there. It was in one such space that Uma found herself that night.

After pouring over the damn map for hours, trying to figure out if it was legit or just another trap (and given its source, Uma’s hopes weren’t high), she’d finally said, “To hell with it,” and set off into the unknown with Harry by her side.

It didn’t start out promising, First, the map led them past the docks and through the trash heaps on the edge of the Isle, near the sewage plant. The smell was worse than anywhere else, which was really saying something. Uma tried to breathe through her mouth, he eyes watering as she picked her way through piles of garbage. There weren’t many Isle residents around this area, not even scavengers. Almost everything they had came from Auradon’s garbage and cast-offs, and people would sooner layer and hoard their possessions than get rid of them, so stuff had to be pretty much useless to be thrown out here. Even so, Uma felt a few pairs of suspicious eyes on them from the shadows. She tugged the collar of her coat up further, glad that she’d tied her braids back and shed most of her bright colours.

Eventually, they reached the end of the garbage dump, and found themselves at the farthest side of the Isle. They peered cautiously over the edge of the cliff, down at the waves crashing against the jagged rocks. It was a sheer, deep drop. Uma couldn’t see either a purpose or a method for going any further.

“I’m gonna kill her,” she growled.

Harry frowned at the map. “It says there’s a path down the cliff.”

“There ain’t no path, Harry. That little goblin just wanted us to wade through garbage.” She glared back over her shoulder, as if Celia might have followed them just to gloat. “I don’t care who her daddy is, I’m gonna keel-haul her if it’s the last thing I do.”

“Captain!” he said, suddenly excited. Uma looked, and found him lying on his belly, leaning over the edge at a worrying angle.

“Woah, be careful!” she crouched down and grabbed a fistful of his coat.

“Do you see that?” He pointed down the cliff, heedless of his own safety. Uma gingerly lowered herself a little further and followed his gaze. At first, she could see nothing in the dim light. But then a brief slither of moonlight stole through the clouds, illuminating the rough outline of some stairs carved into the cliff face.

“Okay, I guess,” she allowed. “But how do we get to it without dying?”

Harry nearly folded himself in half over the cliff, and Uma had to grind her teeth together to avoid making a panicked sound. “There’s an overhang all along this cliff edge,” he told her. “Ye can’t see it from back there, but there’s a wee platform just underneath, which is where the stairs begin. We can get to it just fine if we use the rope.”

She sighed. “Okay, then. Guess we’re doing this.”

He shuffled back like a lizard and stood up, uncoiling the rope from his shoulder. Uma secured it to a nearby sewage pipe that was jutting out of the ground, and gripped it tightly just to make sure. Harry wound the end of it around his waist and backed himself off the edge of the cliff. He saluted her with a smirk. “Kiss for luck?”

She tightened her hands around the rope and gave him an unimpressed look. “Just get on with it.”

He bowed and, without further ado, hopped backwards off the edge of the cliff. Uma bit her lip as the rope went taught, trying to ignore the hammering in her heart. “Harry? _Harry_?”

For a long, terrifying moment, all she could hear was the wind, and the crash of the waves against the rocks. Then, finally, “All secure! Come on down, Captain!”

Uma blew out a breath and then tied herself to the rope. She wondered why she was feeling so on-edge; they did dangerous stuff every day. Harry was the most sure-footed person she knew, and she was pretty agile herself. The chances of them dying here, as opposed to getting run through with a gang-members’ sword, were pretty slim. But as she balanced herself on the edge of the Isle, buffeted by the roaring wind, Uma couldn’t help but feel like this was a totally unfamiliar threat. She’d never been to this part of the Isle, and she had no idea what they were even walking into. She wondered if the uncertainty, more than the risk, was the thing that made her nervous.

She grit her teeth and told herself to get over it. Things were going to just keep on changing. They were off the edge of the map, and she just had to keep rolling with the tide.

Uma took a deep breath and jumped.

_

Auradon loved a good ball. Mal would never in a million years admit this, but she actually liked a good ball, too. The pageantry, the candlelight, the dancing, the smiling, poisonous conversations that went on below the shining surface … yeah, there was something appealing about that. Mal would be totally in her element, actually, if it weren’t for the fact that she had to keep her mouth shut and smile the whole time.

“You _can_ speak, you know,” Evie whispered to her, circling back after making her way around the ballroom. “No one is forcing you to hang off Ben’s arm all night like a doll. Or sulk in a corner, for that matter.”

Mal grumpily took a sip of the fake champagne stuff that they fed the minors, watching Ben chat to Duke So and So from Wherever Who Cares. “What would I talk about?”

Evie flapped her hand airily. “Whatever you like. The weather. School. Nice and friendly anecdotes from the Isle.”

Mal shot her an incredulous look. “’Nice and friendly’?” Did we grow up in the same place?”

Evie huffed. “It’s called artistic license, Mal, and it would be very helpful right now.”

Mal shook her head. “You know I’m garbage at small talk. I’ll just make things worse.”

“Not sure you could do any worse than me,” Evie said despondently. “I ruined it before we could even get in the door.”

“You? How?”

“You know, the … _harem_ thing. Honestly, what was I thinking? Now it’s all everyone’s talking about,” she moaned.

Now that Mal looked, she saw a number of people on their phones, whispering to each other and giggling, or looking scandalised. Her heart sank; news travelled fast, and had a way of getting bigger along the way. Mal dreaded to think what social media had done with Evie’s retort in the past forty minutes or so. “Look, don’t worry about it. If anything, people would be cheering, I mean, you totally slayed that guy with your sparkling wit.”

“I know, but it was wasted on him. He was just some dumb journalist.”

Mal couldn’t argue with that. If _she_ was going to unleash some classic Isle Repartees, she’d have chosen a more deserving target. Audrey, maybe. Someone smart enough to get it, prissy enough to be offended, and maybe, bold enough to snark back. _That_ was where the fun was. “Oh, well. This is Auradon, okay, they’ll find something else to clutch their pearls over soon enough.”

“I hope so.”

They stood together a while longer, and Mal found herself hating this whole thing all over again. Auradon people were so _weird_ about relationships. It was all, Boy Meets Girl, Boy Saves Girl (or vice versa), One True Love forever and ever. Sure, maybe the survival-based alliances of the Isle weren’t super romantic, or anything, but at least they didn’t get hung up on numbers or gender. Like, who had time to care about that?

 _Harem_. Honestly.

“I don’t think Ben’s enjoying that conversation,” Evie said. “You should probably go and rescue him.”

Mal glanced back over at her boyfriend. He did look a little uncomfortable, though you’d have to be a Ben Expert to pick it. He was standing much straighter than usual, as if unconsciously trying to draw up to his full height (he tended to slouch around his friends), and there was a tiny crease between his eyebrows despite the smile on his face. Duke So and So was clearly _not_ drinking the fake champagne, and his hand gestures were getting rather sloppy. “Maybe you’d be better at that,” Mal suggested.

“I don’t think I should,” Evie said. “Some … distance might help this issue go away faster.”

Mal didn’t like the word ‘distance’ where Evie was concerned, specifically because she felt that she was also being included in it. It also bothered her that Evie was so bothered. She’d weathered worse insults and insinuations than this since moving to Auradon. “Hey, are you okay?” she asked, reaching out.

Abruptly, Evie turned away. “I’d better go back to mingling,” she said, and walked off.

Mal frowned, watching her disappear into the crowds. She felt trapped, her feet bolted to the polished floor. She wanted nothing more than for this stupid ball to be over, so she could pin her best friend down and knock some of the jitters out of her.

A raised voice distracted her. She glanced back at Ben, and noticed with some alarm that he was inching closer to the Duke, an outright unhappy look on his face. Their … conversation, or whatever it was, had turned to more of a debate, and looked to be heading close to an argument. Mal hurriedly downed the rest of her drink and headed over to them.

“… Look, evil can be a product of its environment, sure, but _true_ evil is a genetic trait. That’s just facts,” the Duke was saying.

“I’d love to hear your sources on that,” Ben said, nearly snapping.

 _Oh boy._ Mal wrapped her arm around Ben’s elbow and pasted on her biggest, fakest smile. “Oh, there you are, Honey,” she said. “What are we talking about?”

The Duke looked momentarily caught off-guard, as the (obvious) subject of his theory suddenly appeared out of nowhere. Well, what did he expect? This was a ball, and she was the future queen. Of course she was going to be attending, whether anyone liked it or not.

Ben, for his part, still looked frustrated. “Nothing,” he said, still glaring at the Duke.

He was becoming less tolerant of this kind of thing, Mal realised. That was a problem. She’d have to talk to him about it later. Gently, she tried to tug him away. “Well, I’m so sorry to interrupt, but I think your father wanted to speak to us.”

“Ah, King Beast,” the Duke said, before Mal could drag her boyfriend away. “I’d love to hear _his_ thoughts on this matter. Forgive me,” he said to Mal, with a smile so fake it could give hers a run for its money. He bowed. “Duke Albert of Saxondale, at your service.”

Mal had no idea where Saxondale was. Maybe it was close to Snow White’s kingdom. “Such a pleasure,” she said through gritted teeth.

“We’d better go see my father,” Ben said, finally allowing Mal to save his ass. They managed to make a quick exit before Duke Albert got brave enough to use Mal as his information source. She didn’t think her ‘nice and friendly’ anecdotes from the Isle would convince him that true evil wasn’t genetic. Especially since she didn’t even believe that herself, really.

“Thanks for that,” Ben said quietly, once they were some distance away.

“Usually you’re the one saving me from uncomfortable social situations,” she said. “I’m surprised I had to do it for you.”

“You’re always saving me,” he said, finally giving her a genuine smile. "From real problems, even."

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, yeah. But like, what gives? If I didn’t know any better, I thought that was gonna turn into a brawl.”

“A brawl? No. No way.”

“Are you sure? Because I didn’t think some little duke from some little place would be the one to make King Ben snap, but it sure looked like it. Jay would be devastated. He’s been wanting to see you knock someone out for ages.”

He rubbed a hand over his eyes. “I know, I know. It was stupid to get angry. I just … I’m so _sick_ of hearing that nonsense from people, you know? And I can’t just let it go. It’s my job to convince people that we need to give people from the Isle a chance, no matter _who_ their parents are.”

She drew him off to the side and fixed him with a serious look. “Ben. Come on. You convinced a bunch of the worst villain kids in history to a: abandon their plan to take over the world, b: decide that they had a place here in Auradon no matter where they came from, and c: that they were worth caring about. You did that in, like, a _week_. While _cursed._ You can make anyone do anything.”

He frowned slightly, looking at her as she were an interesting puzzle that he thought he’d worked out a while ago, only to find out that a piece was still missing. He had that look quite often. “Mal, I didn’t make any of you do anything. You were already there. I just had faith that you’d make the right choice when it counted.”

 _I want to be good._ Mal’s own words echoed in her head for a moment. She still didn’t really know what they meant. Villains could be a lot of things – brave, loyal, forthright, and intelligent. But they couldn’t be good. When Mal had chosen that, all she’d known for certain that was she wanted to be _happy_ and _safe_ , and she’d wanted that for her friends as well. Ben made her feel happy and safe, so she did what she had to do to stay with him. Go to school. Defeat her mother in a battle of wills. Save the kingdom that had oppressed her since birth. Dye her hair blonde and act like a perfect princess. All those acts had gone against her deepest nature, so she’d assumed that they were ‘good’.

As it turned out, ‘goodness’ was more complicated than she could ever imagine. Judging by Evie and Ben’s actions recently, goodness seemed to be bashing your head into a wall repeatedly, hoping to make a dent at the expense of your own sanity.

And yet, Ben seemed so _sure_ that she was cut out for it. Even now, Mal couldn’t disappoint him. “Well if I made the right choice, then so could everyone else, right?” she said. “Even overdressed twats like that guy?”

Ben sighed. “I don’t know. These people have it too easy. They’ve never had a reason to want to change.”

Mal looked around her, at all the rich people and royals and heroes. Most of them were old enough to have fought Mal’s mom, and other villains. They’d had to fight for their happiness and safety, she realised. Now that they had it, they weren’t giving it away any time soon. That kind of desperation couldn’t always be tamed with empathy or compassion; Mal would know. They made their laws in fear, so it was only through fear that they would unmake them. “Everyone has something to lose,” she said to Ben. “Forget the Isle for a minute – what else would these people have to worry about?”

Ben thought for a moment. “Wealth, I suppose. Or reputation.”

“Reputation?”

“Yeah, their … their image. How the people see them.”

“As heroes,” Mal surmised. “Instead of bad guys,”

“Well, yeah. Essentially.”

“Then we need to make _them_ look like the bad guys. Worse than the kids from the Isle. If the people of Auradon think that, then they’ll put the pressure on the ones at the top to change the laws. Right?”

Ben frowned. “Well, maybe. I don’t think it’s as black and white as that, though.”

“Auradon is built on black and white,” Mal said impatiently. “We just have to flip the spectrum.”

He still looked uncomfortable with the idea, though she couldn’t see why. It wasn’t like the press had any issues with making _Ben_ look like the bad guy. Or Evie, for that matter. And there were plenty of normal folk out there who lapped up the tabloids, and would turn on their leaders if given half a chance. Why not use that to their advantage?

“Mal, you know I value your opinion,” Ben finally said. “But I’m the king. I can’t just run a smear campaign against everyone who disagrees with me. I need to do this the right way. Or else it’s not worth doing.”

Mal grit her teeth and forced herself not to retort. He was too damn noble for his own good.

A flash of blue both caught their attention at the same time. Evie was standing across the room with a group of people, captivating them. She said something and they all laughed.

“Maybe Evie can charm everyone into making the right choices,” Mal joked, just to break the tension.

“If anyone could, it would be her,” Ben agreed.

Mal watched her best friend for a minute. Some of the people in Evie’s circle whispered to each other, poisonous smiles on their faces as they looked at her. Mal felt her fists tighten. They didn’t deserve the pleasure of her company.

“I’ll go get her,” Ben said, startling Mal. “And then we should leave. You were right before; this ball is a waste of time.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I’m not going to vilify my dissidents, but you have a point. These aren’t the people we need to convince.”

Mal felt a spark of warmth in her chest as he walked back over to Evie. Maybe she and Ben would never be the same kind of leader, but he listened to her. Respected her opinion. Maybe she could be his queen after all.

She was so preoccupied with this feeling of pride, and relief that they would be getting out of here soon, that she didn’t think to go get Evie herself. As it was, Mal barely caught the tail-end of one guy’s comment (“Come to take your concubine home, your Highness?”) before she realised her mistake. Her head snapped up just in time to see King Ben – tired, frustrated, beautiful Ben – punch someone so hard in the face that they fell to the ground. The sound of his knuckles cracking against the guy’s cheekbone echoed around the floor. Everyone look around, gasping or crying out in alarm The man hit the floor and did not get up.

_

Uma was panting from exertion by the time she reached the end of the staircase, her skin slick with sweat and sea-spray. The tide lapped at their calves as they waded alone the cliff face, flooding into Uma’s boots. She said nothing and kept going. Harry was a reliable shadow before her, leading the way down the perilous path until it levelled out at sea level. She felt like she was journeying into the underworld, beyond Hades’ lair. But there were no gods or monsters or mythical trials to be faced here; just sheer hard work.

Climbing back up was going to be a _bitch_.

“Captain,” Harry said, stopping suddenly. He pointed with his hook at the mouth of a cave, where a faint yellow light flickered.

Uma’s heart leapt. “Behind me,” she ordered. Reluctantly, he allowed her to take the lead. Uma silently crept into the cave, holding onto the stone walls for stability. The air became warmer and drier the more they ventured, the tide withdrawing further away. Eventually, they reached a rounded grotto. Piles of trash and treasures lay in circles around a raised platform at the centre of the grotto, where a small fire burned.

A man sat by the fire, silhouetted from its low. Uma stopped behind an outcropping of rock and peered around it, trying to get a better look. He was large and bulky; hard to take in a fight, if it came to that, though Uma was used to bad odds. He stirred a pot above the fire, humming to himself. The smell of food – _good_ food, and Uma would know – made her belly rumble.

She glanced back at Harry, ready with warning to stay silent as they observed and approached, when suddenly, the man spoke. “Well ahoy there, mateys. Who goes?”

Uma froze. The man spoke in a deep rumble, friendly and inviting on the surface, but with a sweet core of menace beneath. The seconds ticked by silently, and he hauled himself to his feet. One of his arms stretched a touch too far to the side, clicking and whirring mechanically. It made him look even bigger.

“Come now, I can here ye from all the way over here. Come on out, don’t be shy.”

There was no point in being stealthy, now. Uma exchanged a significant glance with Harry, drew her sword, and stepped out of the shadows. “I’m Uma, daughter of Ursula,” she announced.

The man grinned. It wasn’t a pleasant sight; his face was discoloured from burn scars, a curse, or something else. His teeth were yellow. His eyes were cunning and greedy. “An absolute pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss Uma,” he said, bowing. “Long John Silver, at your service.”


	13. Descent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Uma and Harry acquire a new ally (maybe) and Ben faces the consequences of his actions.

“The hell kind of name is ‘Long John Silver’?” Uma said, staring at the man. He moved easily around the cavern, hauling pots and bowls around, seemingly unconcerned with the two pirates standing in his territory with their weapons drawn. She was on edge, admittedly, but she couldn’t help it; everything about him, from his mechanical limbs to the self-satisfied smile on his face, just screamed ‘danger’. But at the same time, something about him was oddly familiar. She couldn’t put her finger on it.

“Well, now,” he replied. “That would be the name they gave me, Miss.”

“Why? Is it supposed to sound scary or something?”

He shrugged in an exaggerated manner, his whole body heaving with the weight of it. Again, Uma’s eyes were drawn to his metal arm. It was clunky and the joints squeaked with rust, but still looked more sophisticated than any other tech she’d seen cobbled together on the Isle. He probably had a whole arsenal of weapons tucked away in there. “Meant to sound memorable, perhaps.”

“It can’t be that memorable, I’ve never heard of you.”

“I have,” Harry muttered in her ear. “Me da used to talk about him. Thought he was dead.”

“Aye,” Silver said. “Well, that was a long time ago. Nowadays I keep to me own self. Much simpler that way.”

Uma looked around the cave. She’d never known someone on the Isle to have this much space all to themselves. “You’re pretty out of the way here, I’ll give you that.”

“Well it’s no shining castle on a hill, but it does me well enough,” Silver said humbly. “Now.” He turned to face them, causing Harry and Uma to tense up automatically. “What brings Ursula’s daughter and James Hook’s son here to my little corner of the Isle?”

“How’d ye know me?” Harry said suspiciously.

“There’s a certain, eh, family resemblance,” Silver said, rather drily. “Me and your old man go back a ways, but that was long before you were born, lad.”

“He told me you were a coward who slithered out of every fight he ever started,” Harry said bluntly, before Uma could elbow him into shutting up.

Silver merely grinned. “Aye, he would. O’course, one might be inclined to call the man who makes enemies of children a bigger coward, hmm?”

Harry growled under his breath. He himself had called Hook a coward, and worse, but if anyone else insulted the man then he usually took it personally. Probably because he resembled his dad so much. Uma shot him a warning glare and stepped forward before this could escalate. “You wanna know why we’re here?” she said. “Fine. We came for a business proposition.”

Silver clapped his hands together. “Well now, of course ye did! Tell me, lass, what do you need smuggled? Money? Booze? Treasure? A pair of fine young entrepreneurs such as yourself would need only the finest transport arrangements. And to be sure, you’ve come to the right place for that.”

Uma sceptically eyed the rowboat tethered to Silver’s little rock. It was battered and worn, and had clearly seen many rough days at sea. But it looked sturdy enough. It would probably fit about a dozen skinny people, if they packed in tightly. Sure, _getting_ the kids here would be a pain in the ass, but Uma was pretty confident that their passage off this wretched side of the Isle would be pretty much invisible. It was the best chance they had. Still, she couldn’t rush into anything, especially not with a guy like Silver. “The cargo is on a need-to-know basis.”

“Is it, indeed?” he said indulgently.

Uma grit her teeth. “For now. Until I know we can make a solid deal. But I can tell you it’s … fragile. Irreplaceable. More than booze or treasure.”

He rubbed his chin. “And will ye be needing it transported over sea or land?”

“Sea,” she said, unable to keep the ‘duh’ out of her voice. “Wait, you smuggle _on_ the Isle, too?”

“Aye, when the occasion calls for it.”

“How?” she demanded. Silver was one of the most unusual looking people she’d ever met, and that was saying something. Uma couldn’t fathom how he could sneak anything anywhere.

He threw his head back and laughed. “You’d be surprised how easy it can be to blend in, lass. People are only too happy to see what they want to see, if ye give them the chance. In fact, they’ll queue up in droves for it.”

At the last phrase, he pitched his voice a little higher, more sing-song-y. It made him sound miles more disarming, even slightly half-witted. Suddenly, Uma remembered where she’d heard his voice before. When she was a kid, her mom used to send her down the street to their rival fish’n’chip shop, the _Treasure Trove._ Uma had been tasked with trying to sneak inside and find out how they made their crappy fish taste ten times better than Ursula’s. Uma had never quite managed to get inside the kitchen, but she’d had many conversations with the nice, funny man behind the door. He’d tossed her scraps of food and taught her bawdy sailors’ songs, and never seemed to get sick of her stupid questions. Not like Ursula.

Eventually, Uma’s mom had given up on the spy mission and put Uma to work in more useful areas, like waiting tables and scrubbing floors. Uma hadn’t even thought about that other place in years, but some of those songs had stuck with her. In fact, she’d shared them with her crew.

“You?” she said, wonderingly. Harry shot her a bewildered look. “You were that damn fry cook down the street, this whole time?”

Silver bowed. “At your service, Miss Uma.”

“But … but I ain’t never …” she spluttered.

“As I said, it’s easy enough to blend in when ye give people the chance. Speaking of which,” he said, his gaze turning serious. “This cargo o’yours wouldn’t happen to be human-shaped now, would it?”

Uma went quiet for just a second too long. He nodded to himself. “Aye, I thought as much. I must say, that level of risk would incur a naturally higher fee. As would the, ah, moral weight of it.”

“Moral weight?” Harry snorted. “Since when is a man like you is weighed down by morals?”

Silver shrugged. “Aye, it’s not a barrier I often come up against. But trafficking humans, especially young-uns as I’m sure you’ve got in mind, makes even a man like me pause.”

“We’re not trafficking kids,” Uma snapped, her hands balling into fists. “We’re _saving_ them.”

“Oh,” Silver said. “Are ye, now?”

Harry made a defeated noise, and Uma felt a pang of shame at her own impulsiveness. Now that she’d confessed a _noble_ purpose (bleh) behind their ‘business venture’, Silver would find them much easier to manipulate. She should just get out now, while they still could. But something kept her rooted to the floor of the cavern, glaring down the only adult to show her any kindness as a kid. She had no illusions that he was as much a villain as anyone else on this rock, but like it or not, they needed him and his stupid little boat. Maybe if he thought she was a noble idiot, he’d underestimate her.

“I am,” she said. “And you’re going to help me.”

He rubbed his hands together. “Now that sounds like a good place to start, Miss Uma. Let’s talk business.”

_

Ben’s knuckles hurt. He flexed his fingers out, curled them in, and then flexed them again. They still hurt. He wished they hurt more, though.

“Are you listening to me?” his father barked.

Ben glanced up. “Yes.”

“Good. Now, as I was saying, the ramifications of this are almost _insurmountable_ , do you understand that? I mean, he’ll live and his family will be angry but we can deal with that, but the amount of people who witnessed it – and at an event like this, too! I mean, what were you thinking?”

He’d already asked this question a few times, only to barrel ahead with the lecture, so Ben didn’t bother trying to answer. But then he felt his fathers’ hands on his shoulders. “What were you _thinking_?” he said again, almost beseechingly.

Ben couldn’t give him a good answer. “I wasn’t. I’m sorry.”

His father shook him slightly by the shoulders. From the corner, his mother made a small protesting noise but she didn’t say anything. “Sorry? Sorry won’t _fix_ this, Benjamin!”

“I know.” Ben stood up, slipping out of his father’s grasp. “Nothing will.”

The room was silent for a long moment. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw his mom go to his dad, trying to calm him down with a hand on his shoulder. _Give him a moment_ , he read. _Let him process. Let him think_. He tried to do that, using the brief moment that she gave him. “I,” he said, then stopped. His hand flexed. “I didn’t think. I just heard the insult, and it made me angry. People had been saying things like that all night, and I just … couldn’t deal with another comment. About Evie and Mal.”

Belle’s face creased. “Oh, Ben,” she said sadly.

His father just rubbed his eyes, sighing.

“Is the prince okay?” He couldn’t even remember the guy’s name, or where he came from. It occurred to Ben, suddenly, that he didn’t care about this the way he should. He cared in the same way that he cared about financial security, and people he’d never met, and the legacy he would leave for hundreds of years. It was a deep, existential, distant fear, and it paled in comparison to the worry he had for the girls sitting outside his office, still in their ballgowns, listening in even though he’d told them to go back to their dorms and get some rest. He cared about how this would impact on them. Everything paled compared to that, and it shocked him a little, how obvious it felt.

_Uh oh._

“Like I said, he’ll live,” Beast said. “It was a mild concussion, no major damage. But that’s not the point! You should know better, _control_ yourself better!”

“Come, now,” Belle chided her husband. “It’s not like you’ve never lost your temper.”

“And look how well that turned out,” he snapped at her. “The kingdom doesn’t trust me. That’s why Ben has to be better than me! Sure, maybe this time was a mistake, but it could have been …”

“So much worse,” Ben finished, staring at his hand as he flexed it. There was a new fear, rising up through his brain now that the adrenaline had faded, choking his airways. “I could have … killed him.”

“No,” Belle said immediately, her voice loud enough to startle the both of them. She approached Ben, then, her hand outstretched towards him, wanting to comfort him like she did when he was a child.

He shied away. “I could have. We all know that.”

Beast folded his arms bluntly. “Well, yes. You could have.”

“Beast!” Belle said, turning to him with shock and betrayal. “How could you say such a thing?”

“Because it’s the truth! He’s my son, which makes him a lot stronger than the average person, we’ve always known that. Remember all those things he broke when he was a child?”

Ben remembered. He remembered china and wood and glass cracking beneath his hands when he got too careless, and the confused shame he’d felt. Then terror, because what if that had been a person who had been turned into an object, like in his mom’s stories? He broke a teacup once, and couldn't look Mrs Potts in the eye for a week. After that, he’d forced himself to be so careful and gentle, never reacting physically, even when he got scared or angry. _Especially_ then. It became second nature. That all went out the window tonight, though; maybe his nature had changed. Again, he thought of how that might impact on the girls, and Jay and Carlos, and even Uma. Every person who’d ever had a reason to fear violence. Would they be scared of him, now they’ve seen that side of him? The thought of it made his chest clench in panic.

“They were accidents! He’s never hurt _anyone_!” Belle insisted.

Beast sighed. “Maybe it would have been better if he had. Then, at least, he would have learned. Like I did. Now is not the time to be tested; he’s the _king_ , for God’s sake! And if this happens again, mark my words, the people won’t like it. They’ll call for another removal.”

Ben glanced up, confused. “Could that happen?”

“Maybe. If there’s enough pushback and the Council thinks it’s in Auradon’s best interests, some other royal family would be more than happy to fill the position. I know we call ourselves monarchs, but none of us have a divine right to rule. We’re effectively a democracy.”

Ben rubbed his eyes, trying not to feel irrtitated at being lectured on his own government. “I know that, dad.”

“Then you know what’s at stake, here! Do you _want_ to lose the throne?”

For a moment, Ben considered this. The idea of not being king was … well, completely foreign. Sure, it had happened earlier than he’d thought, but it was always going to happen. He had no idea what it would be like, to live without the weight of the crown pressing down on him, and all the responsibility it entailed. Part of him was intrigued to find out. Almost longing.

But if he wasn’t king, then who would fix the Isle situation? Maybe someone would, eventually. When it was far too late.

Ben forced his hands to stop flexing, putting all thoughts of broken pottery and cracked bones out of his mind. “It won’t happen again. Ever. I’ll make a public apology, and own up to what happened. Then we’ll move on from it.”

But Beast just shook his head. “It won’t be enough. Ben, son, this isn’t working. You keep going on like this, with the villain kids, and I can guarantee it _will_ happen again.”

His anger, so close to the surface despite everything, flared up once again. “This isn’t _their_ fault, dad, it’s mine.”

“I’m not blaming them, it’s just the truth.”

“How can you say that? They’ve done nothing but play by all our stupid rules and bend over backwards just to be accepted. _I’m_ the one who screwed up, but I can fix it, okay?” His father remained firmly unconvinced. Ben felt a hint of panic, knowing that everything he’d worked for was starting to slip through his fingers. “Let me fix this!”

Finally, Beast sighed. “We will fix this. But you have to stop with this villain relocation program.”

“No,” he said immediately.

“It’s the only way. Ever since you started this, it’s changed you.”

“And that’s a bad thing?” he demanded.

“In some ways, yes! You’re less calm, you’re irrational …”

“We’re worried for your health as well, Ben,” his mother added. “It’s clear that you’re stressed and not sleeping.”

“And now there’s the violence,” Beast said, in a pointed way that made Ben’s hackles raise.

“This is not their fault!” he yelled.

“LISTEN TO ME!” Beast roared back, loud enough to make the small chandelier in his study rattle. Taking a breath, he continued. “I’m not saying it’s their fault. Or their influence, for that matter, What I’m _saying_ is …”

“It’s because you love them,” Belle interrupted softly.

Ben looked at her, startled. “I … well, of course I love Mal, I’ve told you that, but …”

“Not just her,” she continued, a small, sad smile on her face. Evie’s face popped into his mind, making him panic – _was it that obvious?_ – but then she continued with, “All of them. Evie, Jay, Carlos … even that sea-witch girl still on the Isle, I’m sure. You’ve always been compassionate, but this is different. Whether they are your friends, or something more, you love them and would do anything for them. Isn't that right?”

Ben went silent for a moment, acknowledging the truth of her words. He couldn’t explain it, but he couldn’t deny it either. “Is that such a bad thing?”

Beast cleared his throat. “No, but you can’t lead policies just with love. You’re too close to this issue, Ben, and it’s not working. Not for them, not for you, and not for the rest of the country you’re responsible for.”

Ben closed his eyes, resigned. He’d been worried for so long that he was messing this whole thing up. Now he knew it was true. “So that’s it, then? We stop trying to fix things on the Isle because I _care_ too much?”

Beast rubbed his chin with his hand. “Now, I didn’t say that. Perhaps it’s time we invited the girls in?”

_

Evie wondered how long it had been since Ben and his parents had been shut away in their office. She was too scared to check her phone, even for the time, so all she could do was guess. If felt like hours, but the reality was probably closer to twenty minutes. Twenty long minutes of Beast’s yelling, and Ben’s silence, and Mal pacing back and forth across the corridor like a caged predator. Even now, she looked beautiful with a scowl on her face and her skirts sweeping across the ground. Evie, on the other hand, felt like a ghoul that should have ceased to exist at midnight. Her eyes felt red and raw from all the times she’d rubbed them, her hair was a mess, and her corset was starting to hurt.

She just wanted this disaster of a night to be over.

The door at the end of the hall burst open, and Carlos ran up towards them. Evie was glad to see him; it was nice to have a friend who wasn’t directly part of this whole mess. “What happened?” he demanded. “Did Ben really hit someone?”

“You boys are very slow on the uptake,” Mal said crossly, not pausing.

“Not me,” Jay said, following at a slower pace and scrolling through his phone. “I’ve got all the coverage. Ben’s already a meme; look, here’s a gif of him punching the guy, with ‘harem rights’ flashing in sparkly letters. What does that even mean?”

Evie whimpered and buried her head in her hands. “This is all my fault,” she moaned.

“No, it’s not,” all three of them said at the same time. But Evie knew that was wrong. Ben reacted because of a comment about _her_. He, the most gentle person she’d ever met, had been provoked into violence because of _her_. It was the kind of twisted, romantic notion she’d have dreamed about as a child, her mother’s voice promising that _men will fight and kill and die for your beauty._ In reality, knowing him and knowing what was at stake, it only made her feel sick.

Beast yelled something again, and this time (for the first time tonight) Ben yelled back. The four of them fell silent, listening in. The walls were too thick to make much sense of the conversation, but Evie could infer that it didn’t sound good.

Carlos wandered over and sat down beside her. “Is he okay?” he asked.

“He’ll live,” Mal said dispassionately. “I saw him twitching and moaning as the guards dragged us out.”

“It wasn’t even a solid punch, from the look of it,” Jay added. “I mean it was awesome, don’t get me wrong. But it was all force, no technique. And he didn’t carry it through properly. The guy will be up no time.”

Evie exchanged a small, sad smile with Carlos. She knew he’d been asking whether Ben was okay, not the guy he’d punched.

Suddenly, the door opened. Evie shot gracelessly to her feet and Mal stopped pacing. Former King Beast stood in the doorway, his eyebrows raised expectantly at the four of them. He didn’t look as angry as Evie had been expecting; just tired. “Ladies,” he greeted. “Would you join us for a minute?”

Evie smoothed her skirts out and followed Mal into the office, trying to regain a little bit of dignity and composure. For Ben’s sake, if not her own.

Unsurprisingly, the boys also made to enter, causing Beast to hold up his hand. “I don’t think …”

“Let them all in,” Ben said in an uncompromising voice.

Beast sighed and waved them on through, with the air of one who knew it was time to start picking his battles if he wanted to go to bed sometime soon. Ben was seated close to his mother. He looked about as bad as Evie felt, with red-rimmed eyes and defeated shoulders. But he put on a brave smile nonetheless. “Hey, guys.”

“Don’t ‘hey’ me,” Jay said, pretending to be indignant. “You picked the one ball I wasn’t invited to to completely lose your shit. Not cool, man.”

There was an awkward pause as Belle and Beast pretended not to hear him. Ben tried to chuckle, but it came out sounding rather pained. In fact, he looked like he was seconds away from actually crying. Carlos elbowed Jay in the stomach and hissed, “Read the room!” before going to stand next to Ben in a gesture of solidarity.

Jay softened a bit. “I was kidding. It’s not the end of the world, right?”

Ben looked at Evie as he replied. “No. Everything will be okay.”

She managed to unwind just a little.

“Okay, so what do we need to do?” Mal said brusquely, looking between Ben and his parents.

Beast folded his arms. “Well, a formal apology will be needed, to start with. And some one-on-one discussions with the boy and his parents. As for the next few weeks, I think it’s best if you three lay low. No provocative comments, no shocking announcements, and absolutely no interviews with the tabloids unless it’s related to dress design or tea party etiquette. There is going to be a lot of nasty speculation over this and you absolutely cannot respond to it. Is that understood?”

Mal scrunched her face up, but nodded in resignation. “We can do that.”

“And the Isle program?” Evie asked, unable to hold herself back any longer.

Beast eyed them seriously for a moment. “It’s still going ahead.”

Evie felt her knees go weak with relief, and had to lean on Jay, briefly, for support. He ruffled her hair fondly, which she allowed because it was a mess anyway. “Told you so,” he whispered to her.

“However,” Beast continued. “We are going to be making some changes. Ben will no longer be in charge of the program.”

“What?” she, Carlos and Mal exclaimed in unison.

“We’ve already discussed it. Auradon can no longer cope with seeing their king so heavily invested in such a controversial issue. He needs to step back and let someone else handle this, just like any other policy.”

“But no one else can do it!” Evie said. “He’s the only one who cares enough!”

He raised an eyebrow, and she shrank back, ashamed of her outburst. But she couldn’t help it; what would she do without Ben? They were a team. It was only together that they managed to come this far.

“That,” Beast said. “Is exactly the problem, I’m afraid.”

“He’s right, guys,” Ben said quietly, before any of them could protest further. “If I keep doing this, I’ll just run it into the ground. The kids on the Isle deserve better than that.” He half-smiled at Evie. “You’ll still be involved, of course.”

Evie just shook her head. She didn’t understand how any of this was being blamed on Ben. But it was clear that the decision had already been made and there was nothing she could do about it. “So who will be replacing him?”

“Well,” Beast said slowly. “I was hoping that Mal here might be willing to take the position.”

Everyone whipped their heads around to stare at Mal. She looked utterly poleaxed. “Pardon?” she said flatly.

“It makes sense. You’re a smart girl, you know the Isle, and you have a very … realistic understanding of the risks involved.”

“I’m sorry, is this supposed to make people feel _better_ about Isle kids coming to Auradon?” Mal demanded. “Because they're already scared of me, and they hate me.”

“Actually, you’re very popular with the younger people,” Belle said. “As is Evie. And you’ve made a good impression on some of the more powerful leaders in Auradon. With the right team involved, we think that you’ll manage quite well.”

“Team?” Evie repeated.

“Just a couple of people from the council to help with logistics,” Beast said. “Yes, it will mean having to make a few compromises. But we need to take this out of the spotlight, and make it less of a two-man crusade. It’s the only way it will work.”

There was some sense in what he was saying, the tactical part of Evie’s brain could see that. But she could already see the extra layers of red tape being wrapped around them. And Mal … she loved Mal. Truly. But Mal just didn’t have the same passion for this that she and Ben shared.

That was probably the point.

“So,” Beast said, looking at the two girls. “What do you say?”

Mal glanced at Evie uncertainly, silently asking for her blessing. Evie quickly swallowed down every drop of doubt that she had and gave her what she hoped was a supportive smile. They could make this work. They had to; there was no other choice. She turned back to Beast and said, "Of course."


	14. New Players

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mal finds out why she was asked to replace Ben. Uma deals.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really struggled with this chapter ... maybe because of Beast's characterisation? I've just completely divorced him from his originial character in BatB 1991, to try and make sense of him within this universe, but I'm not sure if it works or not. Basically I see him as what TV Tropes might call a Well Intentioned Extremist, who does bad things for what he sees as good reasons. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on it anyway.
> 
> Warning for slightly more adult language and swearing in this chapter.

Uma was feeling pretty satisfied with herself, all things considered. Sure, she ached fricking _everywhere_ from the climb and her mom was still complaining about the smell she brought back with her, but it had been as much of a success as she could have hoped for. Silver was a slippery bastard, but he’d do the job for as long as it was in his best interests.

Harry disagreed. He did a lot of that, these days. “He’ll double-cross us the first chance he gets.”

“Why would he? Auradon’s gonna pay him more than he’ll ever get here, even if he did want to sell us out. You think your dad or one of his new buddies is gonna outbid the king?”

For once, Harry didn’t bristle at the reminder that his father was a member of the OA. He just frowned. “Alliances might mean more than a paycheck at the end of the day.”

Uma considered this. He had a point. After all, it wasn’t like Silver himself was being offered a ticket to Auradon. He might choose whatever would keep his own business afloat long-term, once the relocation job started to get too risky. “We’ll deal with that when it comes,” she told Harry, brushing aside both of their doubts. She didn’t want to let go of this chance, just because of something that may or may not happen. They dealt with risks like that every day. “It’ll work for now, and what matters is getting rid of as many kids as we can sooner rather than later.”

Harry squinted at her. “You’re starting to sound more and more like His Royal Majesty.”

Uma scowled. Coming from Harry, that definitely wasn’t a compliment. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Ends justify the means, if the cause is noble enough. You make a decent pair.”

“And what the hell is _that_ supposed to mean?”

He sighed, looking resigned. “Nothin’, Captain.” He turned and limped away down to their shared cabin, muttering, “That bloody cliff; me arse is _killing_ me.”

Uma just gaped, unable to come up with a good reason to make him get his sore ass back up on deck so she could argue with him. She couldn’t tell whether she was more offended by the ‘noble’ comment, or the ‘decent pair’ thing. Both concepts made her deeply uncomfortable, and thus, annoyed.

Whatever, she’d deal with him when they were both less sore and cranky. In the meantime, she had a shift at her mom’s shop, and a king to gloat to.

_

“My dad wants to see you,” Ben told Mal the next morning, dashing all her hopes that the previous night had been some kind of awful nightmare. She froze with a mouthful of bacon and stared at him.

“Why?”

He gave her a frank look. “Probably to talk about your new position.”

She winced. “So that’s still a thing, then?”

“Looks like,” he said, buttering a piece of toast with slow precision. It was as if he was being hypervigilant of every little move he made, however insignificant. Mal had been watching him do this for less than twenty minutes, and it was already driving her crazy.

“Are you going to be there?”

“No, I wasn’t invited. Probably for the best, I think.” He shot her a smile that didn’t quite reach the corners of his eyes. “I think he likes you more than me, these days. You might actually get somewhere.”

Mal scowled. “That’s not true.”

He shrugged. “Well, anyway, there’s some other things I need to do this morning. Unless you don’t feel comfortable going by yourself?”

“No, it’s fine. I mean, it’s whatever.” She leaned back in her chair, suddenly lacking an appetite. “What about Evie, does he want to see her, too?”

Ben frowned. “He didn’t mention it, but it would probably be fine. You could take her with you?”

Mal thought of where she’d left Evie that morning, still curled up in bed and unwilling to face the day. “Nah.”

“How … how is she?” Ben asked hesitantly, putting his toast down with the same maddening care.

“She’s okay,” Mal lied. In truth, she hadn’t seen Evie this upset since her breakup with Doug, and even then, she’d still managed to do her hair and go to class. Mal had a feeling that neither of those things would be happening today, and it frustrated her that she didn’t know how to help. “She’s just tired.”

Ben nodded, but he didn’t look the slightest bit reassured. They continued in silence for a few more minutes. Normally, they couldn’t get through a meal in the school cafeteria without other students coming up to Ben and wanting something from him, but today they all stuck to their own tables and gave them a wide berth. Mal would have been happier with this, if it weren’t so obvious how much Ben hated it and was trying to _hide_ how much he hated it. He had such an open face; it wasn’t built for hiding things.

“Are you mad at me?” she asked before she could help herself.

He shot her a confused look. “What? No, of course not.”

“Okay, it’s just, I feel like you really don’t want me taking on this thing,” she said. “Should I have said no?”

He rubbed his eyes and then reached out to take her hand. “That’s not what I think, Mal. I mean, sure. I’m a little disappointed that I can’t be in charge of it anymore. But if it has to go to someone else, then I trust you and I trust Evie more than anyone else. I know you’ll do a great job.”

That was what Mal was afraid of. Once again, her abilities were being overestimated, and from here it was a one-way track to bleached hair and impulsive decisions that led to her boyfriend being kidnapped and love-spelled. She couldn’t let that happen again; she had to be honest. “You know that’s not true.”

“Mal …”

“No, it’s not. Look, I’m bad at politics, I’m bad at working with others, and I am very bad at being diplomatic. Especially with people like Uma. I mean, you know _she’s_ gonna hate this.”

Ben winced. “I’ll tell her. I know you guys have history, but she’s committed to doing whatever it takes. I think she’ll work with you, if you give her the chance.” At Mal’s sceptical look, he said, “Listen, if you want to say no for your own reasons, that’s totally fine. I don’t want you feeling trapped like before. But I know you _can_ do it, and I’m happy for you to. Okay?”

She folded her arms and leaned back, sighing.

“Why don’t you speak to my dad, then make a decision,” he suggested. “I have a feeling he’s not telling me everything, but he might tell you and it could change how you feel about it.”

Mal gave him an incredulous look. “Doesn’t that bother you? You’re the king!”

He just shrugged. “It’s no secret that he doesn’t fully trust me yet. Demanding answers right now won’t help with that. If he’s more open with you and Evie, then I just have to trust that you’ll make the right decisions when it comes down to it.” He smiled weakly. “I don’t really blame him, anyway. I’ve been kind of a mess lately.”

“Ben, being a little tired and punching a guy for calling Evie a whore, basically, is not ‘being a mess’, it’s actually pretty normal behaviour,” Mal said impatiently. Ben winced and glanced around at her use of the word ‘whore’, but screw it. She was over his self-flagellation. “Okay, sure, it was bad timing and everything but you’re not a bad person. You’re still stupidly good and amazing. And you should still be leading this Isle program with Evie, not me.”

He gave her a soft look. “I appreciate that, Mal, but there’s nothing I can do about it right now.”

She blew out a breath and shoved herself away from the table. “Fine. I’ll go talk to your dad, and like, probably still go ahead with it. But he’s gonna know I’m not happy about it.”

Ben smiled. “I expect nothing less.”

As Mal left to go to Belle and Beast’s guest quarters at the school, she thought again about whether or not to get Evie first. Safety in numbers, right? Only, she thought Ben had a point about his dad keeping information, and wanting only Mal to hear it. Curiosity made her continue on by herself. When she got there, the door guards smiled and nodded at her in recognition, before stepping aside to let her knock.

“Come in,” Beast’s voice said.

He was puttering around by his desk when she entered, frowning at some paperwork with his glasses on. He glanced up at her and smiled, gesturing for her to come into the room. For a split second, Mal could almost see the resemblance between him and his son. Although Ben took after his mother more, especially her temperament and looks, he'd inherited some of his more awkward mannerisms from his dad. Since Mal mostly interacted with Beast at family events and balls, where he was in a pretty good mood, she happened to see that side of him a lot. She even found it kind of endearing, despite herself. Still, there was a very calculating hardness behind the goofy dad act, and she could see that, too; mostly when those events got gate-crashed by villains. She never forgot that he’d succeeded in ridding his kingdom of the most dangerous creatures in history, and been absolutely ruthless in keeping it that way.

“Hi Mal, thanks for dropping by. This will only take a minute, then I’ll let you get back to class.”

“Ugh. You can take longer than a minute, I won’t mind,” Mal joked, sitting cautiously in one of the plush chairs.

He laughed at her. “I’m sure.”

Mal was pretty sure that Ben was right, and his father genuinely did like her. But liking someone wasn’t the same as trusting them, and she still didn’t know why he’d asked her to take on the Isle position.

“So, what can I do for you?” she asked, hoping he’d get right to the point.

Beast took his glasses off and steepled his fingers over the desk, letting some of that hard interior show through. “How is my son this morning?” he asked, rather than answer her.

Mal raised an eyebrow. “On his best behaviour, Your Highness.”

Beast waved his hand. “You know that’s not what I mean.”

She sighed. “Look, he’s disappointed. And ... can I be honest?”

“Of course.”

“So am I. I don’t understand why he’s being punished like this, or why …” _Why you’re making me a part of it_ , she though, but refrained from saying. “Why I’ve been chosen to take over in his stead.”

“Well, for starters, it’s not to punish him,” Beast said. “It’s to protect him.”

Mal narrowed her eyes, waiting for him to elaborate.

He sighed. “Look, he probably told you that I’m worried about his future and the crown, right? Well, it’s actually worse than that. Most of the people love him, granted, but a few have decided to take this as an opportunity to push for more power.”

“And these few would be, I assume, already leaders or royals in their own right?” Mal said cynically, thinking of all the stuffed twats she’d had to play nice with at the ball.

“Correct. Now, the Council is able to keep a lid on most of that, and the chances of Ben losing his crown are almost non-existent. But if just one of them is given enough reason to think that his leadership will put their country at risk, then they may decide they’re better off being independent.”

She frowned and leaned forward. “Independent? You mean …”

“The United States of Auradon might start to splinter,” Beast surmised grimly. “All that strength and unity that we’ve fought for, it will be gone. And that puts _everyone_ at risk. There are threats out there beyond the villains on the Isle.”

“There are?” Mal said, then cringed at how childish she sounded.

“Of course. They’re not as well-known because we deal with it, but they’re always going to be there. It’s another reason why Ben’s focus needs to shift.”

Mal fell silent for a moment, absorbing all of this. She had her issues with Auradon; it was too perfect, too shallow, too boring. It wasn’t made for creatures like her, who had to file away their sharp edges if they wanted to be accepted. But it was _safe_. The idea that it could become anything like the Isle, fractured and volatile, was a surprisingly awful thought for her. Maybe she’d do okay in a place like that. If she had her friends (allies) and skills (villainous traits), and a worthy opponent (like her mom) to fight, she’d have an actual purpose here. But what about her friends? What about Ben? They were made for better things than that; they thrived here in Auradon, with all its safety and opportunities. If there was anything Mal could do to maintain that for them, she knew she had to try.

Swallowing down her confusion, Mal nodded slowly. “I understand,” she said. “But so would Ben. Why can’t you be honest with him about this?”

“I have,” Beast said. “And he’s filled in most of the blanks, I’m sure.”

She shot him a suspicious look. “There’s another reason you want me to do this, isn’t there?”

He hesitated for a moment, then leaned forward to fix her with a serious look. All traces of the goofy, middle-aged dad fell away for a moment, and Mal felt that she was staring down a foreign leader. One who might consider her an ally, but for the moment, she was as much of a threat as anyone else. She felt her spine straighten in response, and her eyes flash green for a split second. Beast smiled grimly. “You’re the child of Maleficent, Mal. The worst there ever was. You know her, and other villains, better than anyone. Now, I do appreciate the effort you put into being here, and being good. It’s obvious how hard you try, for Ben’s sake.”

“Is it?” she snapped, her hands tightening over the arms of her chair. She felt like she was being put under a microscope, and she hated it.

“To me, it is,” he said. “Because I feel the same, most days. If it weren’t for Belle, or Ben … well. Let’s just say, people would see a very different side of me.”

“We’ve seen it,” Mal said in a low voice, before she could stop herself. “Everyone who grew up on the Isle has seen that.”

Beast narrowed his eyes briefly, but then nodded, accepting that. He stood up and went to stand by the window, looking out over the Auradon Prep grounds. “You know,” he said. “It’s popular around here to think that goodness is something you’re born with, or born without. But that’s not quite true, is it? It’s a choice you make every day, even when it gets hard. Badness is just the same. I made a choice to do something bad, because I knew it would lead to good for others. I think that, if it came down to it, you would do the same.”

Mal bristled at the implication that they were so alike, but she couldn’t deny it, either. There was a beast inside her skin as well, and maybe it was made of fire and scales instead of fur, but she had to force it down sometimes as well.

“More than that,” he said, turning to look at her. “You know what choices the people on that Isle are likely to make.”

“Most kids will choose good,” she said, with a conviction that she didn’t know she’d had, before now. “I know they will. They just don’t have the opportunity, yet.”

“Then give them the opportunity,” he said. “But if they don’t take it, or they can’t … then I trust that you won’t get yourself hurt over and over again, in the hope that they might finally change.”

 _Unlike Ben,_ she surmised. That was what it all came down to, in the end. Mal could hate everything else about this, and she could deny anything he claimed to know about her, but she knew that they’d both do what they had to do to keep Ben safe.  “Fine,” she said.

He clapped his hands together and grinned, Goofy Dad once again. “Great. So, would you like to meet the new members of the Isle Relocation team?”

Mal blinked, surprised. “Now? Without Evie?”

“I had someone go and get her. She and the others are waiting for us in the conference room down the hall.”

He really did have it all planned out, didn’t he? Mal bared her teeth in a poisonous grin; he already knew she was a monster and was, in fact, relying on that. So there was no point faking for him anymore. “I’d be delighted.”

Beast led her outside the office and down the hall, while Mal hurriedly finger-combed her hair and tried to look like a responsible leader rather than an angry, resentful teenager. The door swung open, revealing a long table with various people seated around it. Her eyes were drawn immediately to Evie, seated closest to the door. Her friend still looked a little tired and red around the eyes, but other than that she was as immaculate as always. Her smile turned relieved when she spotted Mal. After the conversation she’d just had, it was nice to be seen as something _good_. Mal smiled back.

“Thank you for waiting,” Beast was saying, holding out a seat for Mal before sitting himself at the head of the table. “Some of you know each other, but how about we make some introductions anyway?”

“Please no icebreakers,” Mal said, drawing a laugh from him, Evie, and one or two others who were seated. Fairy Godmother was there, of course, smiling indulgently. Esmeralda the Romani representative was also present. Beast introduced her as being in charge of the family fostering program. Mal hadn’t ever had much to do with the her, but she and Evie exchange a familiar, happy look, so she guessed that there would be no issues there.

The next of them to be introduced was a young man from Arendelle, whose ginger hair was streaked with silver despite the fact that he barely looked thirty. He didn’t smile, and in fact, barely held Mal’s eye for a couple of seconds before looking away. She tried not to frown; was he nervous because of her? Apparently his role was ‘risk-analysis’, so maybe he was just wary of the world in general.

There was a man in a naval outfit, who Beast introduced as Captain Turner, in charge of physically transporting the children via sea. He had an easy grin and had laughed at her icebreaker joke, so Mal wasn’t worried about him.

The last person present made her heart sink. Audrey’s grandmother, Queen Leah, sat primly at the end of the table, her hands folded. She raised her eyebrows when Mal looked at her. “You seem a little dismayed, young lady,” she said.

“Just surprised,” Mal said, trying to school her features. “I thought you’d made your position on the Isle kids pretty clear, Your Majesty.”

The woman spread her hands. “I do have my reservations. However, since this is happening regardless, then it is important for my kingdom to be proactive and involved, so that we might come to some happy compromises. I’m sure you understand.”

“Of course,” Beast interrupted. He was smiling, but Mal caught the hard look in his eyes again. She remembered his warnings from before and realised, abruptly, that Queen Leah was almost certainly one of the people who wanted to see Ben give up the throne. Maybe she wanted it for Audrey. Hell, maybe the Arendelle guy wanted it too. Mal tightened her fists under the table, feeling like she’d just been thrown into a pit of snakes and been ordered to charm them into obedience.

Evie’s hand found Mal’s under the table, causing it to go lax once more. Mal exchanged a knowing look with her friend, and took some relief from that. At least she wasn’t alone.

_

That evening after her shift, Uma switched the TV on to watch Auradon’s news channel. Ben had been talking for days about some kind of shindig, which he, Princess Evie, and Dragon Breath were going to attend and somehow charm everyone that mattered into getting the relocations back up and running. It should have been the top story; Auradon loved broadcasting that nonsense.

She hadn’t told Ben about Silver yet, because what was the point if he didn’t come through on his end and get Auradon to bring more kids through? But she wanted to tell him, so she begrudgingly sat through the entire broadcast without throwing any fries at the screen.

Thus, she was both confused and annoyed when the ball got nothing but eight seconds of footage, and a very rushed segment from the news anchor. What she could see had obviously been edited within an inch of its life. That part wasn’t unusual; everything the Isle saw from Auradon was cut and censored, to show them as ‘beacons of goodness and civility’ or whatever the hell kind of propaganda they wanted to peddle. But sometimes a passive-aggressive tone snuck through and their silence spoke louder on certain topics than anything else could. This was most definitely one of those times.

Uma wasted no time in getting back to the ship and firing up her tablet. Her boot tapped impatiently on the deck as she waited for Ben to answer. As soon as he appeared on screen, she said, “Yo, what gives? I dedicate a whole hour of my life to the crap you people put on TV, and all I get is a badly edited slideshow of the most awkward looking ball ever?”

He looked about as disappointed as her. _“Hi, Uma. Yeah, there’s a reason for that.”_

Harry stuck his head into frame, sickly sweet and menacing. “Out poor captain was desperate to see your pretty face. Better be a good reason for disappointing her like that.”

He was obviously making a joke at Ben’s expense rather than hers, but Uma was still pissed about the ‘decent couple’ thing from earlier, so she shoved him away.

_“Sorry to disappoint. Things didn’t go as planned. There was, um. A slight incident.”_

“What, you run out of canapes or something?”

_“Uh, no. I might have overreacted to something and spooked a few people.”_

Uma had to snicker at how seriously he was taking this. Knowing Ben, he’d probably made someone cry just by looking all disappointed at them. She decided to humour him. “Go on then, what did you do?”

He rubbed his hand with his face and answered through his fingers, mumbling, _“I punched them.”_

Uma stared at him for a moment, then laughed incredulously. “What, seriously?”

“ _Yeah.”_

“Holy shit. Hey Gil, guess what? Ben punched someone!”

Gil hurried over, looking delighted. “Woah, really? Right on, man!” He fist-bumped the tablet screen. After a moment, Ben sheepishly returned the fist-bump, but he immediately looked guilty for doing so.

“Punching someone ain’t a big deal,” Harry muttered, picking at his nails with his hook. “I punched three people this morning, do ye see me being all high and mighty about it?”

Uma waved her hand. “Yeah, but that’s nothing for you. For Ben it’s, like, a dog walking on its hind legs. Or a toddler swearing for the first time.”

_“Uh, thanks for that.”_

“Ok, but really,” she said, turning back to him. “You didn’t react to getting kidnapped, or love-spelled, or nearly drowned with, like, the slightest bit of bother. What made _you_ punch someone?”

He sighed. _“They said something really nasty and inappropriate about someone I care about, and I just flew off the handle.”_

“Who, Mal?” Uma struggled to think of anything that would offend Mal to the point where Ben, of all people, got violent.

“ _Evie,”_ he admitted.

Uma raised her eyebrows. She hadn’t expected that. “Well it must have been bad. What did they call her?”

 _“It doesn’t matter,”_ he said firmly. _“But the point is … there are some consequences.”_

Uma’s delight suddenly turned to ice. Of course, on the Isle, punching people was a pretty normal part of the negotiation process. In Auradon, things were different. “Let me guess,” she said flatly. “No more relocations.”

 _“No, no, they’re still going ahead,”_ he hastened to reassure her. _“It’s just, I’m not in charge of them anymore.”_

Uma and Harry exchanged an uncertain look. For all the shit she gave Ben, Uma knew that he was the only one who would ever both to keep trying to do the right thing by the Isle. She couldn’t imagine anyone else listening to her the way he did. “So who is, then? Evie?”

He closed his eyes briefly, as if preparing to dive off the edge of a cliff and knowing exactly how much it was going to hurt. _“Not quite. It’s going to be Mal.”_

Uma froze. “Pardon.”

“Uh oh,” Harry whispered, backing up a few feet.

_“Not just Mal, I mean, Evie’s still involved, and Fairy Godmother, and a couple of others, but …”_

“She’s gonna be the one calling the shots, though, right?”

_“Um. Fundamentally, yes.”_

Uma closed her eyes. “Excuse me just a sec.”

_“Uh, sure …”_

Uma switched the tablet off and threw it at the deck with a roar of pure rage. Her crew shrank away, wincing. Gil hid behind Harry. Heedless of them, she unsheathed her sword and swung it at the mast, hacking splinters of wood away. Curses spilled from her lips, inarticulate and useless. Eventually, her arm got tired and she stumbled back, breathing heavily. No one would look her in the eye, not even Harry. Uma stomped back over to the tablet and scooped it up off the deck. There was a crack running right through the centre of the glass and for a split second, she was scared she’d broken it for real. But it switched on when she pressed the button, and soon Ben’s face was back, disjointed from the break and as apologetic as before. Uma took a deep breath.

“Tell your girlfriend to watch her mouth,” she demanded, without preamble. “And let’s just get on with it.”

_

Ben sat at his desk, examining his mirror tablet. The glass was split right down the middle, from when Uma had hung up on him. Ben had been surprised; he hadn’t known that the device was magic, but then, magic could appear in the strangest places, across the strongest divides. It seemed to work just fine, regardless.

He was proud of Uma, for agreeing to the new conditions even though it was obviously not ideal. He was proud of Mal, too. Time would tell whether they could both make it work.

There was a knock on his office door. “Come in,” he said, putting the tablet away.

His father shuffled inside. Ben wasn’t surprised; he’d heard him approach from all the way down the hall. “Hi, Dad,” he said mildly.

“Ben.” Beast folded his arms. “You know why I’m here.”

“Yep.”

His dad held out his hand, looking stern but regretful, just like he had when Ben had been young. _Give me the toy, son. You can have it back when you’ve thought about your actions_. “Give me the tablet.”

Ben hesitated for a moment. Then he held up the device, smiling apologetically. “It’s broken. See? It doesn’t even work anymore.”

Beast took a step forward, frowning at it. “How?”

“I threw it at the wall in a fit of anger.”

His dad shot him an alarmed look. Ben just shrugged. “Guess you were right about me.”

It was emotional manipulation, and he regretted it when his dad’s face creased in guilt. But he didn’t take the lie back. “Ben,” his dad said, haltingly. “You know I believe in you. Despite the decisions that have been made, I know you’re still the best king anyone could hope for.”

“I know, Dad,” Ben said, putting the tablet firmly back inside his draw and folded his hands over the desk. “I understand. I just hope that you’re right.”

Beast sighed. “Me, too.”


	15. Girl Talk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which everyone has a lot of feleings, and is bad at dealing with them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Slut-shaming (mostly self-directed) and other negative mindsets. Extra warning for mentions of drug use.

After the ball fiasco, Evie tried to throw herself back into work. They still had the same goal, after all, even if the components and method were a little different. Even if they now had suspicious minds to compromise with, and unknown agendas, and a new leader to support. It just meant that Evie had to be smarter, and work harder. It wasn’t ideal, but at least it distracted her somewhat from her inconvenient two-person crush, and the fact that it hadn’t gone away when Ben flipped out. Unfortunately, it had only gotten worse.

(Would he have done that for any of his friends?)

But Evie wasn’t thinking about that.

(Did he suspect how she felt? Could he … perhaps … feel a little bit the same …?)

Nope. Not at all.

“Evie, are you listening?” Mal’s voice interrupted her straying thoughts, and Evie was grateful. Looking at her best friend made her feel guilty, and that put a stop to the dangerous, slightly exciting tug in her stomach when she thought of Ben. She hadn’t seen much of him since the ball, and certainly never alone. She couldn’t handle the looks he was giving her. At least with Mal, there was never any chance of her realising the truth of Evie’s feelings; she was far too oblivious. But Ben was an expert at understanding other people. It was indeed possible that he suspected. It was somewhat _less_ likely that he returned the feelings, and even if he did then that would be _worse_ because Mal loved him and Evie would prioritise Mal’s happiness over hers any day. And yet. Part of her wanted to know.

 _Of course, you do_ , her own voice said, echoing around the dark, shameful parts of her mind. _You’re just a flirt and a god-digger, after all. A slut. Nothing’s ever good enough for you._

She shook her head, trying to dislodge the voice. Unfortunately, another one rattled into place. _Good girl,_ her mother said approvingly _. You’ll have them all falling at your feet in no time._

Ugh, that was even worse.

Being a flirt on the Isle had never been a bad thing, it was just … her. It was her weapon, or her resource, if one was being practical. It made her mother proud, so long as she only teased and never followed through. ( _It’s all about image_ ) But here in Auradon, it meant something different. Something bad. That must mean, despite everything, Evie was still bad at heart.

She winced and rubbed her forehead. All these feelings were giving her a headache.

“Evie!”

She glanced up, startled. As always, Mal’s intense stare drove most of the unpleasant, nagging voices from her mind. “Sorry, I was just deep in thought. What were you saying?”

Mal sighed and looked back at the paperwork in front of her. “I can’t make sense of this,” she said.

Evie leaned forward, but not so close that she could smell the shampoo Mal had used that morning. (She didn’t even know why that would be distracting; it was the exact same shampoo _Evie_ used. But her brain was being extra stupid at the moment, so she was erring on the side of caution). Casting her eyes over the papers, she said, “It’s the Auradon Prep policy booklet. All new students are getting one, apparently.”

“A _booklet_? I can barely lift it! Most of the kids won’t even be able to read it!”

Evie made a face. “I know. I’ve put the admin team in charge of condensing the information. Add some diagrams, flowcharts, that kind of thing. Honestly, it doesn’t matter if they actually read it or not, we just have to tick the box by making sure they have one.”

Mal flipped to a section in the back, which was printed on pale pink paper. “What’s this bit?”

Evie’s lip curled slightly. “Queen Leah’s additions. Policies specific to her own state. Since she’s agreed to settle some of the children in her own kingdom when we run out of room here in the capital, she wants them to know what will be expected of them.”

Mal snorted. “So, she wants them to behave like Audrey? Man, is she gonna be disappointed.”

She thought of Audrey; tense, uptight Audrey, always terrified of putting one foot out of line. For once, Evie felt an odd pang of empathy for the girl. As insufferable as she was, Audrey struck her as someone with lots of voices in her head – just like Evie. “Let’s worry about that later,” Evie suggested, eager to change the subject. “Shall we review the list?”

“Fine,” Mal said, shoving the policy book away and picking up the list of children who they were expecting to arrive next. Immediately, she frowned and scribbled out a name. “Oh, no way.”

“What?”

“Jason Badun? That guy’s an ass, he can’t come to Auradon.”

Evie bit down on a frustrated sigh. “Well his cousin Harold is, and we can’t separate them.”

“Both of them together is even worse! I mean, they were into some seriously bad stuff, back then. And they were awful to Carlos. Remember?”

“I’ve spoken to Carlos, he’s fine with it.”

Mal set her jaw stubbornly and crossed out Harold too, for good measure. “They’re more trouble than they’re worth.”

“They could change,” Evie protested. “We did!”

“Yeah, but we wanted to. Those guys never wanted anything that wasn’t stolen or, like, ingected through the eyeballs. In fact, they’d probably smuggle a bunch of stuff in with them, get the whole campus addicted to something that was made with rat poison.”

“Mal, that’s what the security checks are for,” Evie said, exasperated. “It’s not like when _we_ came, they’re going to be searched.” Privately, she thought that was a little sad. Sure, it decreased the risk of magical items or dangerous substances getting through, but it also meant losing what meagre possessions they had. But that was a battle she wasn’t going to even try and fight, right now.

“What would they even do here? They’re over eighteen, school would be wasted on them.”

“Uma, Harry and Gil are eighteen … ish,” Evie pointed out. She actually had no idea exactly how old most of the kids on the Ilse were; it was rare for parents to keep track of their birth dates. But she could make a good estimate. “And they’ve done much worse than the Baduns, but they’re still coming.”

Mal’s face darkened. “Maybe,” she muttered.

“What … oh Mal, no,” Evie said, finally putting her foot down. “I know you don’t like Uma, but she’s the only reason any of this is happening. There is no way Ben is going to deny her or anyone on her crew entry into Auradon.”

“I know, I know.” Mal shoved herself away from the table and started pacing. “It’s just so contradictory! I’m supposed to be in charge of this thing because I know what risks to watch out for. But then I just have to ignore it when some kids pose a definite, actual risk?”

“I know it’s difficult. I’m not suggesting otherwise.” Evie watched Mal for a moment, considering. “Have you spoken to her yet?”

Mal mumbled something that amounted to a ‘no’. Evie sighed. All communication from the past few days had come through Merryweather and Doctor Sweet at the community centre. They did their best, but it had been much easier to make decisions and get things done when Ben had just contacted Uma directly. “You need to reach out to her; set an example. It’s probably not going to be as bad as you think.”

The remark earned her an incredulous look. “Are you kidding?”

Evie raised her hands helplessly. “Sometimes we just have to take a chance on people.”

Mal snorted. “You sound like Ben.”

“Is that such a bad thing?” Evie said, surprised. “I mean, you are in love with him, right?”

“Of course I am,” Mal snapped. “But he’s dumb sometimes, and you’re not. At least, I thought you weren’t.”

Evie reared back slightly. She didn’t know why that stung so much, but in her tired, confused, emotionally fraught state, it did. Coming from Mal, who once made Evie cry with happiness by telling her how she smart she was, it really, really did.

Mal froze, regret flashing over her face almost immediately. “Evie … I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that.”

“It’s fine,” Evie rasped, turning away.

“No, it’s not, it was mean. And untrue. I’m sorry, okay?” Her hand landed on Evie’s arm, achingly gentle. Evie couldn’t handle it right now; she jerked away. Now it was Mal’s turn to look hurt. “Evie?”

“I need some space,” Evie said, supressed emotion making her sound abrupt. “I’ll come back later.”

“What is with you lately?” Mal demanded.

Despite herself, Evie paused halfway to the door and turned around. Mal looked angry, and upset, and very confused. But she'd immediately apologised, without any kind of defensiveness or shame. And heaven help Evie, but even when she almost wanted to slap Mal for being so stubborn and belligerent, she was still beautiful. “What?”

Mal hesitated for a moment. Unsure, as always, when it came to expressing how she felt. “Just, lately it feels like you’re trying to pull away from me. Have I been that awful?”

“No,” Evie said, feeling wrecked.

Her best friend took a step forward. “Look, I … I know I’m not Ben. I’m not good at this, and I’m scared of messing it up. But I’m _more_ scared of messing _us_ up.”

“Us?” Evie whispered, unable to help herself. _Desperate slut,_ her own voice whispered.

Perhaps seeing some sliver of hope on Evie’s face, Mal crossed the distance between them and took her hand. This time, Evie didn’t have the conviction to pull away. “You’re my best friend, Evie. I care about you just as much as Ben. Will you please tell me what’s wrong?”

Evie faltered in the face of Mal’s undivided attention, the fierceness of her eyes. She opened her mouth, and for a split second, she almost told her. _I love you. I think I love Ben. I’m confused. I’m sorry. Please don’t hate me._

She swallowed heavily, unable to stop a couple of tears from falling. “I can’t.”

With a strength she didn’t know she possessed, Evie pulled out of Mal’s grasp and fled.

_

More than anything, Mal hated feeling helpless. Evie was probably the last person she’d ever expected to make her feel that way, but here she was, choked up and frozen, watching her best friend run away from her.

Mal glanced back at her desk, piled high with reports, statistics, policies and plans. Photos of children from the Isle, sneering, scowling and smirking. She couldn’t help but think, if it weren’t for them, this wouldn’t be happening. With a sudden roar of anger, Mal swept her hand across the desk and sent it all crashing to the floor. The books fell hard, while loose sheets of paper fluttered down around her, slow and unbothered.

As quickly as it came, Mal’s rage left her. She sat herself down in the middle of the mess she’d made and leaned her head back against the desk. It was easy to blame the Isle for everything, but she knew it wasn’t the reason why Evie was upset. It was Mal’s fault. It was always her fault, because she was a villain, the worst of the worst, and she wrecked everything without even trying; without even knowing what she did _wrong._ Sure, she was impatient and snappish and even mean, sometimes, but that had never bothered Evie much before. There was something else going on, and Mal just couldn’t see it.

Mal’s eyes landed on one of the items that had landed on the floor. It was a mirror tablet, identical to the one Ben had used to contact Uma, but brand new. She made a face as she picked it up, glaring at her own reflection in the dim black screen.

 _Reach out to her_ , Evie had said. As if it was that easy. As if Mal didn’t feel an anxious, resentful ache in her stomach at the mere thought of talking to Uma. She just couldn’t help but look at her and see an enemy. Of course, what Evie didn’t understand, and what Ben _definitely_ didn’t understand, was that Uma wasn’t just any old villain. Things had gotten personal between her and Uma, once upon a time, and Uma had made sure it stayed personal when she chose to love-spell Ben rather than just try to take the wand some other way. And yet, somehow, Uma had turned herself into the good guy here. The one why got stuff done, the one Ben trusted Mal just didn't get it.

She knew she was holding a grudge. Sue her, it was a family trait.

Well, there was no point trying to reach out to Uma when she was already feeling irritated. It would only lead to a fight, and while that might make Mal feel a little better, it would probably torpedo this whole program. Instead, she picked herself up off the floor and impatiently brushed away a couple of tears that had slipped out. Then she left the office that Beast and Fairy Godmother had generously gifted them for their project. It was just down the hall from Ben’s office. She glanced over at his closed door, wondering if she should go talk to him about her worries. He’d listen, and probably give some decent advice about talking to Evie, and being honest about her feelings. But Mal couldn’t do that right now; she didn’t have the words for it.

Thus, Mal kept walking, down to the boys’ dormitories where she knew she could find the only other person capable of helping her.

Just as she’d thought, Carlos was in his room, working on some kind of knick-knack on his desk. He raised his eyebrows at her when she let herself into the room. “Hey,” he said cautiously, taking in the frown on her face. “What’s up?”

Mal folded her arms across her chest. “Where’s Jay?”

“Still at practice.”

“And Jane?”

“Uh, she had some social committee thing on tonight.”

“What about Dude?”

“I don’t know, I think he went to heckle Chad at jousting practice or something … why? What’s going on?”

Mal took a deep breath, satisfied that no one else was here to witness her moment of weakness. Jay would be fine, probably, but Jane still looked at her with some measure of fear and awe, and Mal hadn’t had that in so long; she didn’t want to squander it. As for Dude, he was the worst damn gossip in this entire school. “I need some girl talk.”

Carlos looked confused. “Okay? Um, I think Evie’s …”

“No, not with Evie,” she said abruptly. “Just with you.”

His face went through a series of emotions, as if it wasn’t sure whether to land on ‘offended’ or flattered’. Finally, he nodded in resolve and went to sit on the edge of the bed, leaning forward in earnest concentration. “Okay, I’ll do my best. Hit me.”

She got right to the point. “Evie’s mad at me, and I need you to find out why.”

He waited a moment longer. When she gave no further information, he said, “Is that it?”

“Yes. Yes, definitely.”

He slumped forward in disappointment. “Mal, I don’t think that’s girl talk. Shouldn’t it involve, like, talking about feelings and sharing uncomfortable truths? That kind of thing?”

“Mm, no, I think I’m good on that front.”

He tried anyway. “What makes you think she’s mad at you?”

“Uh, because she can’t seem to look at me or be within five feet of me, and also she just ran away crying for no reason. Look, if I knew, do you think I’d be here? Just find out for me, okay?”

He frowned. “What if she won’t tell me?”

“She will. You’re good at that kind of thing.”

He looked distinctly unimpressed by this assessment. “Okay, but she’s still your best friend. I don’t know if being sneaky is going to make her feel better, or want to open up about things.” He gave her a searching look that reminded her distinctly of Ben, which sucked. “You seem really upset by how she’s acting. Are you sure you’re not making me do your dirty work so that you can avoid talking about your emotions?”

Mal scoffed, turning away. “No. I just don’t have time to think about it, with everything that’s going on. Look, can you please just talk to her?”

Carlos sighed. “Yeah, I will, because I’m worried too. But …”

“Okay thanks Carlos! Good talk!” she said, already hurrying out of the room.

“But I’m not gonna be a go-between!” he called after her. As she shut the door behind her, she heard him mutter, “So much for girl talk.”

_

Uma knew it was only a matter of time before she got the call. Honestly, she wished Mal would just get on with it. Every day that went by, she got nothing but radio silence, and it only made her angrier. She was like a storm hovering over the horizon, constantly on the verge of breaking. Her entire crew were avoiding her as she stomped around the deck, even Harry. Uma didn’t mind a bit of healthy fear and respect from her crew, but after Jonas dropped an anchor on his own foot when she walked past, it was obvious that her bad mood was just making things worse. So she’d done the responsible thing, and gone down to the Community Centre to take it out on them instead.

Doctor Sweet assured her that things were on track. The crew from Auradon were going to meet them at the right coordinates, and there would be no unexpected surprises. But Uma couldn’t trust that; some part of her was convinced that Mal would call the whole thing off, or sabotage them somehow.

“You know, you _could_ call _her_ ,” Doctor Sweet suggested as she paced around his office. “Just a thought.”

“I shouldn’t have to! I’ve been doing all the work here, and she has done precisely nothing, but suddenly she’s supposed to be the leader? And she can’t even be stuffed talking to me? Screw that!”

“You’ve never seemed like the type to let principle outweigh pragmatism,” Bagheera said drily. He didn’t seem to have a purpose in the room aside from going out of his way to make snide remarks at her that she barely understood.

“The hell does that mean?”

“It means that I thought you would be more smart than prideful. But alas, I forgot I was talking to a teenager.”

“Oh, screw you,” she snapped.

“You can’t control other people,” Dr Sweet cut in wisely. “You can only control your own actions. And, look, ninety percent of the time that’s all it takes to get the outcome you want. Eventually.”

She crossed her arms, still fuming. “It ain’t right.”

“I get where you’re coming from, Uma,” he said sympathetically. “All my life, I’ve had to put in five times the effort just to get ten percent of the regard that others are just handed on a platter.”

Uma felt that. She was always the one who was scrounging and scraping for more. The one who had something to prove. She slumped into one of his chairs, which had originally been very nice and plush, but had since been scratched to pieces by more than one kid with a pocket-knife. “Mal won’t even give me ten percent,” she confessed bitterly. “What’s the point in even trying?”

“Well, think of all the people who do respect you. The king, for instance. And your crew. And more people on this here Isle than you think, probably.”

Uma’s shoulders hunched up slightly. She knew that her crew were pretty loyal, as far as villain kids went, but she had to maintain a certain level of authority to keep them that way. As for the rest of the Isle, their opinion could change like the tide. If she slipped, she’d fall right down to the bottom of the heap. And Ben, well … he’d respected her unconditionally, but he wasn’t there anymore. Not in the same way. She hadn’t realised how much she’d gotten used to that until it was gone. “It doesn’t matter. Mal’s in charge now, and Mal couldn’t care less for my input. Nothing I do is gonna change that.”

“Maybe she’s feeling the same,” he suggested.

Uma gave him an incredulous look. “How’d you figure that?”

“Well, you said it yourself. You’ve been doing all the work, gotten things this far, and she’s new to the whole thing. Maybe she’s feeling a little intimidated.”

“Mal ain’t intimidated by anything. She’s too full of herself for that.” Something stung her in the chest – an old, childish sense of shame. It hadn’t bothered her for years, but after her recent humiliation at the Cotillion, it had come back. “Nothing I do will _ever_ make a difference to her.”

“Does stamping your feet around in anger make a difference?” Bagheera asked, not unkindly. “Does it even make you feel better?”

Uma growled in frustration. She _did_ feel kind of guilty about Jonas’ foot. “Fine, be the experts. Tell me what the hell I should do.”

“Not an expert, but I can tell you what I would do,” Sweet offered. “Set an example. Be proactive, take the first step, and show her how a real leader acts.”

Uma couldn’t help but feel amenable by this idea. Even if it was stupid, even if they had no real idea what it was like between Mal and Uma (or how she would probably feel inferior to the stupid bitch for as long as she lived), they had one thing right; waiting around and being angry was not productive. So, in an unused room of the centre, Uma pulled her broken tablet out, took a deep breath, and pressed the call button.

She expected no answer, honestly, and was almost proved correct. Then just before it rang out, Mal’s face slowly swam into view, a mess of purple and white pixels.

 _“Uh, hello?”_ Mal said, and despite the deadpan tone of her voice, she almost sounded a little unsure. Uma thought for a wild second that perhaps Sweet had been right, and Mal was feeling slightly intimidated. But then her face fell into its usual sneer. _“Oh, it’s you.”_

Uma scoffed. “Who the hell else were you expecting?”

_“Actually, I was expecting a peaceful night, which was probably stupid of me. What do you want, Uma?”_

 “Wow, sorry to disturb your beauty sleep. Ain’t it a shame we all got jobs to do?”

_“There’s a little thing called business hours, Uma. Maybe Ben put up with you bothering him whenever you felt like it, but I’m not doing that.”_

“Yeah, well, I’m not putting up with being ignored. You’re not the boss or nothin’, okay? It’s a partnership, which means you gotta listen to me whether you like it or not.”

Mal narrowed her eyes. “ _Are you really in a position to be making threats?”_

Uma grit her teeth, trying to clamp down on her temper. She wanted to set the record straight with Mal, but not provoke her. It was just hard to talk to her without wanting to strangle her. “I’m not threatening anyone. I’m just telling you how this works; you gotta talk to me, or else we won’t get anywhere.”

Mal glared at her for a moment longer. Then, finally, she leaned her head back and sighed. _“Fine, fine. I was going to get in contact. I’ve just been busy.”_

It was a surprise to hear something close to an agreement. Uma fought to contain her shock. “So, make time. Look, I don’t exactly wanna see your face everyday either, but we do what we gotta do, right?”

 _“Right. Whatever.”_ She rubbed her eyes. “ _Look, can we talk about work tomorrow? It has been a hell of a day, and I’ve got no brain power left.”_

“Too many dress fittings and press releases? Yeah, sounds awful.”

 _“That stuff IS awful, actually, and you couldn’t do it either,”_ Mal said, which Uma supposed was fair. _“But this is way harder. I’ve been arguing with people all week, and I don’t need to do it with you, too.”_

Come to think of it, she _did_ look wrecked. Her eyes were even a little red, which could have been fatigue, but could have also been something else. Not that Uma had much sympathy, but there was really no point trying to get important shit done if Mal was sleep-deprived and possibly emotional. For all that she pretended to be cold-blooded, Mal had never been the type to deal with her emotions well. “Fine. But if you keep avoiding me, I’ll just keep harassing you.”

_“Noted. Bye.”_

The screen clicked to black. Uma snorted and shoved the tablet in her belt loop. She supposed, all things considered, that hadn’t gone _quite_ as bad as it could have. It was a start, anyway. And Mal had been right about one thing – it was too late to worry about work. Uma headed back to her ship, to spend time with people whose company she actually enjoyed, feeling oddly satisfied.


End file.
